The Welfare Act is 25 years old: many happy returns?

The Welfare Act was created 25 years ago - on 4 August 1996 - to convert the protection of workers’ welfare at work into clear rules. 

The law gives employers a mandatory framework for safeguarding and promoting every aspect of their employees’ well-being, both reactively and preventively. One of the main principles of the Welfare Act is a shift in focus from reaction to prevention. Employers and their managers are given more responsibility for their staff’s well-being, and external services could be enlisted for support.

1. The Welfare Act struggles with the right level of detail
   There has been less progress in some areas than initially hoped. The Welfare Act wanted to deal with obligations that were too detailed in favour of a targeted and decisive approach. 
   
   However, there are many examples of procedures that are bogged down in detail yet again. This is understandable to a degree: the Welfare Act is part of criminal law, and courts need clear and detailed rules to make objective judgments. General rules, such as “an employer must have a risk analysis available”, are open to interpretation. Nonetheless, simplicity and purposefulness are sacrificed as more complexity creeps into the Welfare Act.
    
2. Breakthrough for multidisciplinary approach, but not everywhere
   We talk about ‘well-being’ in the broad sense of the word nowadays, it no longer refers to health and safety only. Disciplines such as psychosocial well-being, ergonomics, and occupational hygiene also have a place in the Welfare Act these days. An ideal scenario would be for the various well-being disciplines to assess the working conditions in an organisation through the eyes of their expertises. This is what’s called a multidisciplinary approach. 
   Unfortunately, this multidisciplinarity doesn’t always extend to real-life situations despite a positive evolution. 
    
3. Small businesses need welfare legislation tailored to their size
   The role of external services in safeguarding and promoting employees’ well-being has increased, thanks to the Welfare Act. This evolution is particularly noticeable in small companies that often do not not have their own trained prevention advisor.
   
   However, the law was and remains positioned as a ‘one-size-fits-all’ solution and does not distinguish between SMEs and large businesses. While large companies have usually implemented a corporate plan, a well-being policy, and internal welfare bodies to apply the law, this is often lacking in smaller companies. This does not take away that well-being at work has gained great importance in recent years, not least to attract and retain new talent. 
    
4. From reaction to prevention proves to be easier said than done
   The Welfare Act had the ultimate objective of shifting the focus from reaction to prevention. In real terms, this takes the form of a five-year plan in which employers map the risks for each well-being domain and put forward a specific approach. As such, companies are required to carry out a risk analysis and formulate their own objectives: they are effectively writing their own rules and objectives.
   
   The idea behind this approach makes sense, but it often goes wrong in practice.
   An example: some organisations have to carry out a risk analysis to prevent employees from coming in contact with hazardous materials. The analysis is used to also outline a prevention policy. In actuality, we have seen that these exercises often focus too much on hazardous substances that cause noticeable irritation. Substances with latent or hidden risks - such as carcinogenics - still fly under the radar too often. All risks in the organisation should be known for a fully-fledged risk analysis and prevention policy.

The creation of the Welfare Act in 1996 was a step in the right direction, but there is still a lot of important work to be done.

One of the Welfare Act’s great shortcomings is also the fact it is not built on evidence-based principles. According to the law, external services must carry out sufficient medical examinations each year. But most employees who come to these examinations are healthy. This focus on routine stands in the way of efficiency. After all, the attention of external services is not properly directed at situations where their intervention is required. Instead of carrying out routine examinations, external services and employers should be able to decide together which employees need intensive follow-up. It’s the only way preventive risk analyses can be genuinely useful. 

In addition, as a sector, we must make all organisations aware that investment in well-being at work pays off. Why? Because it doesn’t just make the employee better, but the whole organisation. Occupational well-being and sustainable profit go hand in hand. Mensura believes that what benefits people also benefits the organisations these people belong to. And vice versa. 

These aspects can ensure legislation based on trust, both in employers, social partners and external services. And thus better adapted to meet the challenges of the 21st century.