Manufacturing & Engineering UK-wide

Set up and run a safe other-manufacturing workshop

Division 32 covers a range of bench and workshop trades — jewellery, musical instruments, sports goods, games and toys, medical and dental instruments, brushes and other goods. Whatever you make, this is the universal spine. It takes you through your core workplace health and safety duties, control of hazardous substances, work equipment safety, manual handling, fire safety, employers' liability insurance, equality and data protection.

Guide summary

Risk-assess your workshop benches, machinery and chemical processes. Provide safe systems of work and train your employees. Control hazardous substances by assessing and preventing exposure. Use local exhaust ventilation, respiratory protection and health surveillance where required.

  • Risk-assess your benches, machinery and hot work
  • Provide safe systems of work for all tasks
  • Train and supervise your employees
  • Complete a COSHH risk assessment before using hazardous substances
  • Use local exhaust ventilation and check it regularly
  • Provide respiratory protection if needed
  • Set up health surveillance when COSHH requires it
  • Get employers' liability insurance
  • Follow fire safety rules and manual handling guidance
  • Comply with equality and data protection laws
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Related guides in Employment & HR

Division 32 brings together a range of small-scale and bench manufacturing trades — making jewellery and related articles, musical instruments, sports goods, games and toys, medical and dental instruments and supplies, brushes, and other goods not classified elsewhere. They share a workshop character: benches, machinery, hand and power tools, and often hot work, soldering, plating, casting and finishing. Whatever you make, the duties in this guide apply to running the workshop and employing people. Get this spine in place first, then deal with the product rules for what you sell.

Health and safety law here is largely devolved. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is the regulator in Great Britain and the Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland (HSENI) in Northern Ireland. The underlying duties are equivalent across the UK. Work through the sections below in order.

A. Meet your general health and safety duty

The Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 is the foundation. You must ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare of your employees and of anyone else affected by your work. Risk-assess your benches, machinery, hot work and chemical processes, provide safe systems of work, and train and supervise your people.

B. Control hazardous substances (COSHH)

Workshops across the division use hazardous substances — solders and fluxes, electroplating and pickling chemistry, casting fumes, lacquers, adhesives, resins and dusts. The Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 (COSHH) require you to assess, then prevent or adequately control, exposure — often with local exhaust ventilation (with statutory thorough examination), respiratory protection and health surveillance where the regulations require it. In Northern Ireland the equivalent COSHH (Northern Ireland) Regulations 2003 apply.

C. Keep your work equipment safe (PUWER)

Your work equipment — presses, lathes, polishing and grinding wheels, saws, injection-moulding machines, kilns and CNC tools — must be suitable, properly maintained, inspected and adequately safeguarded under the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998, and used only by trained operators.

D. Manage manual handling

Moving raw stock, dies, finished goods and packed cartons carries manual-handling risk, so the Manual Handling Operations Regulations 1992 apply. Avoid hazardous manual handling so far as is reasonably practicable. Where you cannot, assess the risk and reduce it through handling aids and safe systems of work.

E. Manage fire safety

Flammable finishes, solvents, dust and hot-work processes give many of these workshops a real fire load. The responsible person must carry out a fire risk assessment and maintain fire-safety arrangements. The duty is devolved. In England and Wales it is the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. In Scotland it is the Fire (Scotland) Act 2005 and Fire Safety (Scotland) Regulations 2006. In Northern Ireland it is the Fire and Rescue Services (Northern Ireland) Order 2006.

F. Hold employers' liability insurance

As soon as you employ anyone, you must hold employers' liability compulsory insurance — normally at least £5 million of cover — and display or make available the certificate. This is a legal requirement across Great Britain, with an equivalent duty in Northern Ireland.

G. Meet your equality duties

As an employer you must not discriminate against, harass or victimise people because of a protected characteristic. In Great Britain this is governed by the Equality Act 2010. In Northern Ireland separate equality legislation applies, enforced by the Equality Commission for Northern Ireland.

H. Handle personal data lawfully

If you process personal data — about staff, customers or suppliers — you must comply with the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018, and in most cases pay the data protection fee to the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO). This applies UK-wide.

  1. 1

    1. Write your health and safety risk assessments

    Assess benches, machinery, hot work and chemical processes, and put safe systems of work, training and supervision in place under HASAWA 1974.

  2. 2

    2. Put COSHH controls in for your substances

    Assess solders and fluxes, plating and pickling chemistry, casting fumes, lacquers and dusts. Control exposure with ventilation and health surveillance where COSHH requires it.

  3. 3

    3. Bring work equipment into a PUWER regime

    Make sure presses, lathes, polishing and grinding wheels, moulding machines and tools are guarded, maintained, inspected and used only by trained operators.

  4. 4

    4. Control manual handling and carry out your fire risk assessment

    Reduce hazardous handling of stock and finished goods. Assess fire risk from finishes, solvents, dust and hot work under the regime for your nation.

  5. 5

    5. Take out employers' liability insurance and register with the ICO

    Arrange at least £5 million of cover before anyone starts work, and pay the data protection fee unless you are exempt.

What to do next

This spine covers running the workshop and employing people. On top of it sit the product rules for what you make:

Official sources

Authoritative health and safety and data-protection guidance.