All health and safety laws reviewed

The Government is to review all health and safety laws with a view to scrapping any that put an "unnecessary" burden on business.

Ministers said regulation will focus on high hazard sites and tackling rogue employers and consultants, not "tying up" the vast majority of Britain's businesses in red tape.

Business leaders welcomed the move, but the TUC warned the proposals were bad for workers' health and safety as well as the economy.

Under the planned changes, responsible employers will no longer face automatic health and safety inspections, with high risk locations such as major energy sites, or rogue employers being targeted instead.

This measure will cut the number of inspections carried out in the UK by at least a third.

Ministers said they also wanted to eliminate "cowboy" health and safety consultants who were unqualified but were deemed to be responsible for many of Britain's most "inappropriate" health and safety recommendations.

A new register of qualified consultants will be made available to businesses, and those who are untrained or give false advice will be excluded from the approved list.

The review of existing regulations will be chaired by Professor Ragnar E Lofstedt, of King's College London and will publish its findings in the autumn.

Employment minister Chris Grayling will tell a conference in London on Monday: "Of course it is right to protect employees in the workplace, but Britain's health and safety culture is also stifling business and holding back economic growth.

"The purpose of health and safety regulation is to protect people at work and rightly so, but we need common sense at the heart of the system, and these measures will help root out the needless burden of bureaucracy."