Using chemicals or other hazardous substances at work can put people’s health at risk. To prevent ill health, the law requires employers to control exposure to such substances.
Employers must protect both employees and others who may be exposed by complying with the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 (COSHH) (as amended).
On 17th January 2020, the HSE published a revised version of EH40/2005 ‘Workplace exposure limits’ which contains the list of workplace exposure limits (WELs) for use with the COSHH Regulations.
It has been updated to implement amendments to the Carcinogens and Mutagens Directive (2004/37/EC), which introduces or revises 13 binding occupational exposure limit values for several carcinogenic substances.
COSHH requires exposure to carcinogenic substances to be reduced to ‘as low as is reasonably practicable’.
For more information, please contact Mark Littlejohns.
