LRD guides and handbook July 2016

Health and safety law 2016

Chapter 7

7. Equipment at Work


[ch 7: page 118]

Key changes and developments since last year


• The general GMB union has won a landmark legal case on Personal Protective Equipment (PPE);


• From October 2015, a health and safety exemption that allowed Sikhs to wear a turban instead of a hard hat on construction sites has been extended by the Deregulation Act 2015 to all workplaces;


• A new directly-acting EU regulation on the manufacture and marketing of PPE has been agreed and will take effect in 2018.