COMPANY LIABILITY FOR THEIR EMPLOYEES

[sheerwater]

This point is going to raise some interesting answers from many sectors. Any business is liable for their employees conduct whilst at work. Health and safety is a statutory requirement for every business. If a person is killed or injured on a building site the Health and Safety Executive move in big time and often fine the company heavily. Do they move in so heavily if a company driver injures or kills someone during work time? If not why not. How many companies require staff to take COMPANY training to drive a fork lift, operate machinery but then rely only on the fact that the person has held a driving licence to employ them as a small van/car driver. It is an interesting point that there are controls on PSV licences, HGV liicences etc but no control on company car drivers. As an example I quote the following true story. I know a guy who due to the extreme desperation for money did the following. Got up at 8am and began delivering cars for a lease company, at 6pm carried a second job as a taxi controller (one hell of a demanding job), at 2am he finished this job and delivered a car from Northampton to Aberdeen where he picked up another car and drove it back to Northampton. Goodness knows what state he was in or how safe he was but there are no laws to stop it. Same with taxi and mini cab drivers. When I did the job there were no controls over the hours I worked and I regularly did a day job until 6pm and then drove a cab until between 2am and 6am before doing my day job again.(desperation for money again I'm afraid but I was a lot younger then) Cheers Nige