European Community meeting of labour inspector trainers (health and safety at work)

Directorate-General For The Information Society And Media European Commission

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• Publié par: DIRECTORATE-GENERAL-FOR-THE-INFORMATION-SOCIETY-AND-MEDIA-EUROPEAN-COMMISSION
• Nombre de lectures: 8
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 2 Mo

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ISSN 1018-5593
Commission of the European Communities
European Community meeting
of labour inspector trainers
(health and safety at work)
Institut National du Travail,
de l'Emploi et de la Formation Professionnelle
(Marcy-l'Étoile—France)
4 to 8 February 1991
EUR 13842 EN s
Commission of the European Communities
health and safety
European Community meeting
of labour inspector trainers
(health and safety at work)
Edited by:
Commission of the European Communities
Directorate-General
Aft uifeARL. EUROP. Bibliotti. Employment, Industrial Relations and Social
N.C.EUR 13842 EN 1992
C1. Published by the
COMMISSION OF THE EUROPEAN COMMUNITIES
Directorate-General
Telecommunications, Information Industries and Innovation
L-2920 Luxembourg
LEGAL NOTICE
Neither the Commission of the European Communities nor any person acting on
behalf of then is responsible for the use which might be made of the
following information
Cataloguing data can be found at the end of this publication
Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 1992
ISBN 92-826-3332-2
© ECSC-EEC-EAEC, Brussels · Luxembourg, 1992
Printed in Germany Contents
Part one:
Introduction 1
Opening address: G. Gouvras (Commission of the European Communities) 3
Reply by J. Courdouan (INTEFP) 6
Part two:
The training of labour inspectors in the field of health and safety at work in the Member
States of the European Community (national contributions) 7
The Belgian system of initial and in-service training for labour inspectors 9
(G. Lamont)
Training of inspectors employed by the Danish Labour Inspection Service 15
(M. Beaufour, T. Modest, J. Jensen)
Initial and in-service training for labour inspectors and technical supervisory staff of the
accident insurance associations in Germany 2
(H. Rading, W. Schnorr)
Training of labour inspectors in the Rhineland-Palatinate 35
(H. Schmidt)
Training of technical labour inspectors in the Greek Ministry of Labour7
(A. Voulgaris, I. Krapsitis)
System of training for senior labour and social security inspectors in Spain 41
(J. Cano Capdevilla, L Garcia Osma)
Training of French labour inspectorate staff in the field of health and safety at work 46
(A. Martinon, A. Cano)
The training of labour inspectors in Ireland 52
(J. Heffernan)
Report on the current situation on basic and continuous training of labour inspectors in Italy ... 55
(L. Cipriani, A. Lorusso)
The training of labour inspectors in the Netherlands8
(P. J. Huyzenveld)
System of training labour inspectors in Portugal 67
(A. Castelo Bento, A. Gageiro)
The training of labour inspectors in the United Kingdom 70
(P. Woodcock) Part three:
General discussion 83
Part four:
The training of labour inspectors in Community law on health and safety at work —
Review and outlook7
IV Part one
Introduction
European Community meeting of
labour inspector trainers
(health and safety at work)
(4 to 8 February 1991) Opening address
G. Gouvras (EEC)
Ladies and Gentlemen,
It is with great pleasure that I welcome you all, on behalf of the Commission of the European
Communities, to this Community meeting of labour inspector trainers.
First of all I would like to thank all those who have made the meeting possible, namely:
(i) the members of the Committee of Senior Labour Inspectors who took the decision to organize
¡t;
(ii) the 11 delegations present (Mr Weber sends his apologies for being unable to come to Lyon
owing to the large amount of work caused by the Luxembourg Presidency);
(iii) Mr Hammer, President of the International Association of Labour Inspectors;
(¡v) Mr Courdouan, Director of the Institut national du travail, de l'emploi et de la formation
professionnelle, who, at our very first discussion in June 1990, expressed great enthusiasm at
the possibility of organizing this meeting here, at the heart of Europe, at the training centre for
French labour inspectors, which has just celebrated its 10th anniversary;
(v) Mr Courdouan's staff, particularly Messrs Doerflinger, Cano, Cascino and Cornet, who have
been responsible for the lion's share of the organization, in conjunction with Mr Brunet and
Mr Baer at the Commission;
(vi) Mr Poos, Head of the Commission's Conference Service, and the interpreters who will provide
interpretation this week from nine languages into five;
(vii) and all those I may have forgotten, but who have contributed in one way or another to the
organization of this meeting — which I now would like to place in context before setting out its
objectives and briefly summarizing the programme for the week.
First of all the context of this meeting
In September 1982 the Commission organized a 'Symposium on the contribution of the inspecto­
rate to the improvement of safety at work', which was held in Luxembourg.
This symposium gave birth to the idea of allowing the senior labour inspectors of the 10, later 12,
Community Member States to meet regularly in order to exchange information on developments in
their inspection systems and health and safety regulations, thus helping to harmonize the often very
different national systems.
This Committee has proved very successful and, in one month's time, its 19th meeting will take
place in Luxembourg.
Of course, the rapid expansion of Community law concerning health and safety at work since
adoption of the Single Act has caused the Committee of Senior Labour Inspectors to step up its
activities in order to avoid a time-lag between the harmonization of national regulations initiated by
the Commission and the application of secondary Community law. Without efficient action at
European level, there is little chance that application will be naturally effective and homogeneous. In the past two years the Committee has taken several important decisions in this context,
particularly those concerning:
(i) development of an exchange system for labour inspectors, which it is hoped will gradually find
wider use;
(ii) preparation and distribution of a handbook on labour inspection to provide inspectors in the field
with basic information on the various labour inspection systems in the Community;
(iii) creation of a system for the rapid exchange of information between national correspondents;
(iv) a comparison of inspection practices based on practical examples;
(v) finally, the reason for our being here today, consolidation of labour inspector training in the field
of Community law on health and safety at work, which has been designated by the Committee
as one of this year's priorities.
Objectives of the meeting
The first aim is to intensify bilateral exchanges between the persons responsible for training their
country's inspectors in the field of health and safety at work, and for this reason we have avoided
classifying the week as a conventional seminar or symposium, preferring the word meeting.
In a manner of speaking, it is a meeting between training supply and demand. In other words, some
of you are looking for ideas to improve your own system, whilst others can recommend ideas
having tried them out with success.
This means that the meeting must not be restricted to the theoretical exchange of information, for
which there will be ample opportunity today and tomorrow with the help of the national con­
tributions. Contacts must also — and perhaps above all — continue outside this room during visits
to the stands and more generally during the large number of 'free periods' arranged by our hosts.
The second objective, of primary importance to the Commission, is to place much more emphasis
on Community law in the training given to labour inspectors in all Member States. From this point of
view I will not hide the fact that by the end of the week we want to come to some very specific
decisions on the subject — decisions which are more specific and ambitious than those taken at a
previous meeting of trainers held at this very same venue in 1983, which some of you attended.
Content of the meeting
The week will be organized so as to achieve these two objectives to the fullest possible extent.
As far as the first objective is concerned, there are three stages:
(i) first of all, presentation of national training systems, covering three half-days;
(ii) the presentation stage will be supplemented by visits to the stands for you to see the video
training tools which several delegations have brought with them;
(¡ii) the third stage will concentrate on bilateral contacts, so that exchanges can actually take place
and each delegation can organize any specific training activities for its labour inspectors in the
field of health and safety — for which the Commission will provide as much support as possible.
As far as the second objective is concerned, two stages seem necessary:
(i) A first stage comprising presentation of inspector training activities already practised by
Member States in the field of Community law on health and safety at work.
The purpose here is first of all to take stock of the situation.
(ii) A second stage involving discussion of the pro