HSE Appoints New Interim Chair As Cuts Deepen

Dave Joyce National Health, Safety & Environment Officer provides details of the latest changes at the HSE:

George Brechin has been appointed as interim chair of the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) in what the HSE describe will be a “short-term arrangement”. The recruitment process for a new HSE Chair began in October 2015 as Dame Judith Hackitt approached the end of her eight years in the role. She stepped down at the end of March and began her new post as Chair of EEF, the manufacturers’ organisation on 4 April.  (Engineering Employers' Federation - EEF, rebranded itself as EEF, the Manufacturers' Organisation in 2003). She replaces Martin Temple CBE, who is stepping down after over 17 years as director general and then chairman of the EEF.

George Brechin served as chief executive of NHS Fife for ten years before he retired on 31 March 2012. Between January 2014 and March 2015 he was interim chief executive of the State Hospitals board for Scotland. A graduate in electrical engineering and electronics from the University of Glasgow, he joined the Department of Health in London in 1972. He moved to the NHS in Scotland in 1988, holding three NHS Trust Chief Executive posts before his appointment to NHS Fife. He has a Companionship of the Institute of Healthcare Management and was awarded the OBE in 2013. He is Vice-Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland and President of the Council of the Zoological Society of Glasgow and the West of Scotland.  The HSE said that Brechin's appointment was a short-term arrangement while the process to recruit a permanent successor continues.

Judith Hackitt succeeded Sir Bill Callaghan as Chair of the HSE (HSC), on 1st October 2007, appointed by the Brown Labour Government for a period of five years and was re-appointed by the Cameron/Clegg Conservative/Lib.Dem Coalition Government in 2012 to serve for three further years, to October 2015. Both Bill Callaghan and Judith Hackitt have been guest speakers at CWU Conference Health and Safety Fringe Meetings.

The two key positions in the HSE are the Chief Executive and Chair. Dr Richard Judge was appointed HSE Chief Executive on 10 November 2014. He was previously Chief Executive of the Insolvency Service and has no background in Health and Safety. He is a Chartered Engineer and previously had a career in science and technology, the nuclear, rail and environmental sectors.

Along with the Chair and Chief Executive, HSE has seven board members: Nick Baldwin, Jonathan Baume, Isobel Garner, Martyn Thomas, Sir Paul Kenny, Frances Outram, and Sarah Pinch.

The Tory government, through the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has announced further cuts to the HSE’s annual budget over the next four years. The budget will be reduced by 12% by the year 2019-2020 bringing the total reduction in budget since 2009-2010 to 46%. In 2019/20, the HSE will receive £123.4 million. In 2009/10 it received £231 million.

With those sorts of figures, it seems perhaps appropriate that the government has appointed a CEO from the Insolvency Service where he dealt with bankruptcy and a Chair now joins him from the Zoo where he dealt with 'Chicken Feed' no doubt.

Source: CWU

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