Ignore safety scaremongers

Hold your nerve and ignore "drama queen" safety experts is the warning being issued by health and safety consultancy SMTS.

Managing director Jamie Cliffe believes some consultants are exaggerating the risks of increasingly complex legislation and the compensation culture.

"Management by fear is not the route to a safer working environment. Our message to directors faced with consultants clearly trying to put the fear of God into them with talk of corporate manslaughter and jail sentences, is to show them the door, and hold their nerve.

"Some of the selling messages we have come across amount to little more than 'hire us or risk going to jail'."

Cliffe, who started SMTS three years ago after 18 years working in both health and safety and training with BP, said a
more sophisticated approach is required.

"We believe that if a workforce is working well together and communicating efficiently, then safety awareness will follow
and attitudes will change for the better."