Health and safety – the language of UK law

The language of the laws is the result of the efforts of parliamentary draftsmen and the parliamentary process itself. In matters of health and safety, the law is often concerned with influencing the behaviour of those who are given legal duties and responsibilities, and usually this is to do with making people and parties do things or not do things. The way this is expressed in legal language is of the utmost importance if the readers of this criminal statute are to fully understand what they have to do in order to comply with the legislation. The author in this paper calls attention to the need for clarity and structure in the UK health and safety legislation, and offers some criticism of one detailed aspect of the present UK health and safety legislation. This recent research work to provide illustrations of the use of alternative language in other countries.