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Environmental Illness – will the law protect you?
Summary of a paper to be given at the conference, ‘Misdiagnosed Illness’, London, 2 – 3rd September 2003.
By AJP Dalton. Co-Director, Centre for Environmental Protection (CEP), London Metropolitan University.
Introduction.
This paper will be somewhat different from the others presented. It concerns the prevention of environmental illness and not treatment; as important as that is. Whether your exposure to chemical or biological agents is at work or at home, or a combination of both, there are three government agencies that should be protecting your health:
- The Environment Agency (in Scotland the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, SEPA).
- The Health and Safety Executive (HSE).
- Environmental Health Officers from a local council.
The Environment Agency
With an annual budget of £650m. and workforce of some 10,500 people the Environment Agency (EA) is the government’s largest quango.
In July 2003 the EA released the results of its fifth ‘naming and shaming of polluters’. The report showed quite clearly that environmental crime does pay! The average fine for some 1,387 serious pollution incidents was £8,744; no deterrent to a one-person band – let alone a multinational company.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE)
In 2001/2002 the HSE prosecuted 1,064 cases and the average fine for these offences –often involving death or serious injury – was £12,194. Again no deterrent to the criminal employer.
The HSE has been the subject of recent cuts and is under funded. Around 600 factory inspectors carried out 70,000 workplace inspections in 2001-02. Yet according to the factory inspector’s trade union, Prospect, 50 inspectors will go this year; meaning 5,000 less workplace inspections.
To deal with the cuts the HSE has prioritized just five areas:
- Slips and trips.
- Bad backs.
- Stress.
- Accidents from industrial transport.
- Falls from height.
As important as these issues are, stress apart, the list could be that of 100 years ago! What about the health hazards of chemicals and biological risks?
Yet, in 2001/02 some 40.2 million working days were lost due to illness and injury.
Environmental Health Officers (EHOs).
Some 12 million working people, in 1.2 million workplaces, rely on local authority EHOs to protect their health. A report published in July 2003 showed that there had been a 10% drop in EHO inspection rates in 2001/2.
In 2001/02 there were 307 prosecutions, with an average fine of £3,134. This was some 20% lower that 2000/01 at £3,903. Again prosecutions are for serious offences, often involving loss of life, serious injury or long-term ill health.
With this pathetic level of fine, why should any employer care about their employee’s health?
Further reading:
EA: See publications of Friends of the Earth ( and Greenpeace ( and DIRT magazine (CEP, 3 Montpelier Grove, London, NW5 2XD).
HSE: See Hazards magazine (
EHOs: See
Safety Health and Environmental Hazards at the Workplace, AJP Dalton, Cassell (1998).
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About the author:
AJP Dalton trained as a chemist and worked in various pharmaceutical companies during the 1960s/1970s. Poacher turned gamekeeper he worked for the British Society for Social Responsibility in Science (BSSRS) on environmental and health and safety issues for workers and communities. One of his books, Asbestos Killer Dust (BSSRS, 1979), caused him to be sued and made bankrupt. He worked on these issues for the Labour Research Department (LRD) in the 1980s and lectured on these issues at South Bank University in the 1990s. He was health, safety and environment co-coordinator for the TGWU from 1995 – 1998; where he sat on many high level HSE committees. From 1999 to 2002 he was on the board of the Environment Agency as a ‘community representative’ until sacked by the then Environment Minister, Michael Meacher, in December 2002. He is currently the joint Director of the Centre for Environmental Protection, at the Working Lives Research Institute, London Metropolitan University and Editor of DIRT magazine.