Health and Safety Executive

3. Mr W complains about the investigation carried out by the Health and Safety executive (HSE). In particular, he says when he raised gas safety concerns with HSE, it failed to thoroughly investigate his complaint and failed to hold the Gas safety register (GSR) accountable for their actions.

4. He has also raised questions about how the HSE regulates the Gas Safety Register.

5. As a result, he says he has lost faith and confidence in the HSE and says he has been caused a great deal of distress and upset.

6. He would like his complaint to be investigated thoroughly by HSE and for all his outstanding points to be addressed. He would also like an acknowledgement of failings and service improvements.

7. Mr W’s partner owns a caravan on a caravan site.

8. In 2022 he reported a gas safety concern to the HSE. However, the HSE determined that the concerns raised did not fall within their remit and needed to be dealt with by the relevant local authority.

9. Mr W also raised concerns about an inspection carried out about a registered gas safety engineer. HSE said this was the responsibility of the Gas Safety Register (GSR) who monitor the profession on behalf of the HSE.

HSE background

10. HSE is the enforcing authority for gas businesses and engineers who work in people's homes. HSE legislation requires engineers undertaking gas work to be competent, to be registered with Gas Safe Register, to work in accordance with the appropriate standards and in a way that does not put people in danger.

11. It regulates downstream gas safety through HSWA and the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998 (GSIUR), GSIUR sets out the requirement for the Gas Safe Register.  This is a register of businesses who are competent and qualified to work on gas in premises within scope of GSIUR.

12. HSE own the Gas Safe brand and operates the service through a service provider (currently capita) under a service concession agreement.

13. HSE has a Gas Safe Register contract management team, who oversee the contract delivery.

14. Since 2009 the Gas safe Register (formerly CORGI) has operated under this agreement with HSE, have a team of inspectors who monitor that gas work is being undertaken competently and safely. They deal with complaints and undertake risk based proactive inspections and work closely with regulators such as HSE and Local Authorities.

15. The GSR is the official gas registration body of gas businesses and engineers in the United Kingdom, Isle of Man, Jersey, and Guernsey. By law all gas businesses must be on the Gas Safe Register. Its main roles are to:

• Operate the official UK list of gas businesses and qualified gas engineers that work for those businesses, as required by law, to ensure only those qualified engineers are licensed to legally work on gas.

• Undertake monitoring inspections of all businesses on the Gas Safe Register to ensure they are applying gas competence.

• Investigate gas safety complaints against registered businesses/engineers for compliance with the Gas Safety (Installation and Use) Regulations 1998 and, where applicable, the technical specifications required to meet the Building Regulations in England and in Wales • Apply a sanctions policy where instances of unsafe work or breaches of rules of registration are identified.

• Investigate reports of illegal gas work carried out by un-registered businesses or gas fitters and report their findings to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). HSE may use this information to from enforcement decisions, which may include letters, notices, or prosecutions of duty holders. To view these prosecutions please visit the HSE website.

• Undertake consumer campaigns to raise the awareness of gas safety issues such as carbon monoxide (CO) and the dangers of using illegal engineers not on the Gas Safe Register. They also co-ordinate the annual industry wide Gas Safety Week.

• Provide a facility for registered businesses to self-certify (notify) that the installations of heat producing gas appliances and the hot water and heating systems they serve are compliant with the Building Regulations in England and in Wales

18. The HSE initially upheld Mr W’s complaint. It explained the initial stage of the gas procedure was not applied correctly, he was not invited to attend the gas safety inspection on 15 September 2022, and it failed to make telephone contact.

19. It said however, once the investigation into the gas concerns commenced, it was satisfied they were in line with the standard expected.

20. In its review response it again stated it did not initially deal with his concerns correctly. It says it should have been clear that issues around the gas infrastructure at the caravan park should have been directed to Great Yarmouth Borough Council (GYBC) as they are the appropriate enforcing authority both for infrastructure and general health and safety matters.

21. Subsequently concerns about the work done in Mr W’s caravan should have been passed directly to the Gas Safe Register (GSR) to deal with the standard of work and the conduct of the registered gas fitter that was involved. Mr W’s concerns about the manufacturing issues in his caravan should have been directed to the Trading Standards department of GYBC.

22. From the information we have seen HSE has accepted there were errors when initially dealing with Mr W’s case (see above), and the chief executive offered an apology for the distress caused. As such, we are satisfied it has done enough to put things right in the circumstances. This is because; it does not appear HSE were not the correct body to investigate Mr W’s concerns about gas safety. Although the HSE should have passed the case on to the GSR, we cannot say they failed to appropriately investigate his concerns, as it was not their role to do so.

23. It is important to note, If HSE receives a complaint regarding a Gas Safe registered engineer gas fitter, it should forward this to the Gas Safety Register (GSR) as a competence complaint, and then they take it forward.

24. Once, HSE were aware of its error it does appear the matter was passed on to GSR to investigate and consider. It also appears that once the HSE received the report from GSR it followed its procedure in respect to whether further action was required on the ‘defects’ found.

25. It is also important to note that it is not the role of our office to scrutinise HSE decision to act or not – as this falls outside of our remit.

26. Any specific concerns about the GSR inspection or report need to be raised with them directly and again we cannot criticise HSE for the actions of GSR.

27. Therefore, although we appreciate Mr W may be dissatisfied with our decision, we are satisfied the acknowledge of failings and apology issued by HSE is enough to rectify any distress caused, given it appears any wider issues and impact relate to actions of the GSR. This is in line with our principles of good administration – Putting things right.

28. Furthermore, in respect to Mr W’s concerns about how the HSE regulates the GSR, this is not something our office can answer and if he wishes to pursue this matter further, he may wish to contact the Information commissioner’s Office (ICO) and make a Freedom of information (FOI) request.

1. We have carefully considered Mr W’s complaint about Health and Safety Executive (HSE).

• We have decided HSE has already done enough to put right the distress Mr W has been caused due to the errors it made when dealings with his concerns.

2. We appreciate Mr W has been caused a great deal of distress and upset when dealing with HSE and understand the circumstances surrounding his complaint have had a lasting impact on him.