Health and Safety Executive

Answer: My Lords, I cannot comment on the case that the noble Lord mentioned, but I can tell him that the Health and Safety Executive is in the midst of developing guidance for inspectors, which will be subject to consultation in due course. It recognises that it is not possible to eliminate risk altogether. Sometimes healthy trees fall over by accident. However, the Health and Safety Executive expects action when trees in frequently visited public areas are unstable because they are obviously damaged, dead or sick.

This is an answer to the Oral question asked on Tuesday, 19 December 2006 by Lord Renton of Mount Harry (Conservative).

Question: My Lords, while thanking the noble Lord for that Answer, I should say that the National Trust had no part in asking me to pose this Question, although the tragic incident of an oak tree falling on and killing an eight year-old boy on New Year’s Day two years ago has not yet been resolved. But surely the point now is that the mention of involvement by health and safety is seen much more as a threat than as a promise. Whether it is children on Father Christmas’s knee or no ladders to mend churches, people simply do not know where they stand. That makes life very difficult in many cases. Specifically on the question of the countryside, surely someone who is not on the public path but is exercising his right to roam must be doing so at his own risk, otherwise the burden on landowners and farmers is intolerable. On that basis, I suggest that there should be a review of the standards set by what is now a 30 year-old Act.

Secondary information

Type: Oral answer to question
Reference: 687 c1888-9
Session: 2006-07
Chamber / Committee: House of Lords chamber
Subjects: Health and Safety Executive National Trust Safety Trees Risk assessment
Link: View this Oral answer to question on www.publications.parliament.uk