Coronavirus safety concerns raised at tax office

The PCS public and commercial services union has used a UIN union inspection notice to raise safety concerns around risk assessments with the HMRC tax office chief executive. A UIN is a tool a union can utilise to formally lodge concerns where it believes there has been a failure to follow health and safety law. PCS referred to six areas of health and safety legislation and required HMRC to resolve its concerns.

In a formal response, the chief executive made three commitments: to consult with PCS on matters affecting health and safety; to review and revise risk assessments as required, with input from PCS; and to share Covid-19 risk assessments and guidance.

PCS also launched an industrial action ballot in response to the Ofsted education inspectorate’s plans to impose a requirement that its offices are 60% occupied by staff every working day. The union called this an “unfair, unjustified and arbitrary compulsory return to the offices”.

As Covid restrictions ended, the union reported increasing pressure being put on staff to return to their workplaces. It made clear that all staff should have a risk assessment as part of the post-Covid return to the workplace process to ensure they are not put into a more hazardous position than working from home. It also demanded provision for vulnerable workers and called for hybrid working to be normalised.