health and safety at work – The NEN

Covid: Ventilation at work

Workplace advice from the TUC

We know that Covid is an airborne virus, meaning it is primarily spread through the air in tiny particles, known as aerosols. Aerosols are different to droplets, which are larger and can be spread from touching surfaces; they are breathed out by a person. That means anyone can spread them, unknowingly: you don’t need to be coughing or sneezing.

Aerosols are small, they can remain suspended in the air for hours. So if you’ve entered a room where someone who is infectious but not showing symptoms has been, even if they have already left, you might still breathe in a Covid-19 aerosol.

A combination of concentration, airflow, humidity and temperature, all contribute to whether the aerosol load will be infectious.

This means ventilation, where we make sure the air is renewed and refreshed regularly, is an incredibly important method for reducing Covid transmission.

Every workplace risk assessment should include aerosol transmission, and outline what steps are being taken to improve ventilation where necessary.

Despite ventilation being one of the most effective ways to mitigate risk, union safety reps have told the TUC that it’s the one employers are least likely to be paying attention to. In some cases, we need to force ventilation onto the agenda through union education and action.

CO2 monitors

More employers are purchasing CO2 monitors, and some unions are making use of them to carry out safety inspections. These devices monitor how much CO2, which is breathed out by people, is in the air in a given space. The higher the level of CO2 is, the more poorly a space is ventilated. A CO2 monitor can’t tell you if you’re breathing in Covid, but it will tell you if you’re breathing in other peoples’ breath. The higher the reading, the more likely exposure will be.

A key threshold to be aware of is 800 parts per million (ppm): if a CO2 monitor is consistently showing a room as reading above 800ppm, action must be taken to improve ventilation, or the area should be taken out of use. 

When using CO2 monitors, remember to:

Take the reading in the most poorly ventilated area of the room, for example do not take the reading next to an open window.
Make a plan to consistently monitor, to improve accuracy and give a better picture for how the air quality is changing: taking readings throughout the day, or week, or adjusting frequency depending on how the space is being used.

You can find more information on using CO2 monitors from the Health and Safety Executive.

Improving ventilation

Your CO2 monitor doesn’t improve ventilation, it only gives you an accurate picture of whether you need to make improvements, and by how much. Further action that may need to be taken can include: reducing the occupancy in a given indoor space, opening windows and doors, and using equipment which can be purchased, such as local air filtration units. 

Ventilation and air conditioning systems can help, but only those which do not recirculate air: any systems which recirculate air around a room or building must be switched off, as these risk spreading aerosols further, rather than filtering them with fresh air supply. Similarly, it’s worth noting that a desk fan which you might have on during hot weather is going to blow air from one part of a room to another: while it might keep you cool, it risks aiding aerosol spread.

Windows

The easiest way to boost the fresh air supply in an indoor space is to keep windows or doors open.

In some workplaces, opening a window will not be an option. With outside air comes other risks: cold temperatures, pollution, or contamination. In some cases, opening windows is simply not an option, for example in a maternity ward, a food factory, or where there are none. This is not a get-out for employers: they must be taking every effort to provide effective ventilation by other means.

Air filtering units

Where existing methods to improve ventilation are not to a safe standard, employers should be purchasing and providing air cleaning and filtering units. These are relatively cheap and highly effective in removing airborne virus from indoor room air.

There are minimum specifications, including the requirement for HEPA (high efficiency particulate absorbing) filters, which remove up to 99% of aerosols. The number of filters required will depend on the size of a workspace. Six ACH (air changes per hour) is considered a safe level of ventilation, and can be achieved by a combination of methods. It is important to bear in mind, CO2 monitoring where air filters are being used will not give an accurate reading of air quality: this is because filtering units will remove virus aerosols, but not CO2 from the air.

Face coverings and face masks

Wearing a face covering will reduce, but cannot eliminate, your risk of infection.

This means mitigations such as mask-wearing (in particular, respirator masks at a FFP2 or FFP3 standard, which are effective for aerosol as well as droplet spread) are all the more important; along with effective ventilation. Keeping a good supply of fresh in indoor spaces can make a big difference in diffusing any potential Covid aerosols. Face masks are not a replacement for good ventilation: where possible, both are preferable.

Actions unions are taking include:

Adopting a union position and demands to the employer, based on the situation in your workplace and the steps required to bring ventilation to a safe level.
Safety reps carrying out inspections of indoor workspaces using CO2 monitors.
Issuing a union improvement notice, or emergency advice including removing oneself from the hazardous environment if serious risk presents.
Utilising union representation on any safety committees to raise the issue, and consultation in risk assessment process.
Holding union member-wide meetings on the subject of ventilation, explaining the problem to members, and deciding on next steps including collective action to force changes to keep workers safe, and escalating matters through formal dispute procedures.

See further resources: 

With thanks to Doctor Jonathan Fluxman for information for this blog. See https://www.docjon.org/

Union advises cleansing workers to prioritise safety and refuse self-isolation exemptions

GMB Scotland has today advised thousands of local government cleansing workers to prioritise safety and exercise their ‘right to refuse’ requests from employers to continue working if they have been exposed to COVID-19.

It follows the Scottish Government’s announcement that double-vaccinated workers in key services, returning negative PCR tests and undertaking daily lateral flow tests, can avoid self-isolation if notified of exposure to COVID-19 by the test and trace app, and continue working if their employer’s requests meet conditions set by Ministers.

The union has over 2,300 members in cleansing and waste services across Scotland’s local government, including Glasgow, North and South Lanarkshire, and West Lothian councils, who have worked throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, and the decision was taken after consultation with their workplace representatives.

GMB Scotland Senior Organiser for Public Services Drew Duffy said: “A major underlying factor in the so-called ‘pingdemic’ is the chronic understaffing in our frontline services after years of cuts, and our cleansing and waste is no different.

“But the Scottish Government’s new guidance has opened the door for employers across the country to heap more pressure on these key workers if they have been exposed to COVID-19. That’s not safe for workers, families, or communities.

“And again, some of the lowest paid are being asked to take the greatest risk in another example of how poorly they are valued by government. You cannot cut and coerce your way out of a crisis, if you want services to function then you must invest in them.

“That lesson needs to be learned, and it’s why we are advising our members to exercise their right to refuse and instead follow the general self-isolation rules if they are exposed to COVID-19.”

Study of UK dental professionals reveals extent of occupational risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection

A University of Birmingham-led study of over a thousand dental professionals has shown their increased occupational risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection during the first wave of the pandemic in the UK.

The observational cohort study, published today (3 June 2021), in the Journal of Dental Research, involved 1,507 Midland dental care practitioners. Blood samples were taken from the cohort at the start of the study in June 2020 to measure their levels of antibodies against SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

The team found 16.3% of study participants – which included dentists, dental nurses and dental hygienists – had SARS-CoV-2 antibodies, compared to just 6% of the general population at the time. Meanwhile, the percentage of dental practice receptionists, who have no direct patient contact, with SARS-CoV-2 antibodies was comparable to the general population, supporting the hypothesis that occupational risk arose from close exposure to patients.

The study also found ethnicity was also a significant risk factor for infection, with 35% of Black participants and 18.8% of Asian participants having SARS-CoV-2 antibodies, compared to 14.3% of white participants.

Blood samples were taken from participants three months later, in September 2020, when dental practices in England had re-opened with enhanced PPE and infection control measures in place, and once again in January 2021, six months after the start of the study, during the second wave of the pandemic when healthcare workers were being vaccinated.

The results showed that of those who had previous COVID-19 infection, over 70% continued to have SARS-CoV-2 antibodies both at three months and six months later, and they were at a 75% reduced risk of re-infection with the virus.

The study also demonstrated the immunological impact of COVID-19 vaccination, with 97.7% of those without previous infection developing an antibody response at least 12 days after their first Pfizer vaccine. In those with evidence of previous infection, the antibody response was more rapid and higher in magnitude after a single dose of the Pfizer vaccine.

Furthermore, none of the cohort with a level of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies greater than 147.6 IU/ml in their blood tested positive for COVID-19 throughout the six-month period from the first to the final blood tests.

First author Dr Adrian Shields, of the University of Birmingham’s Institute of Immunology and Immunotherapy, said: “Understanding what an antibody test result means to an individual with respect to their risk of infection is essential to controlling the pandemic.

“Our study has taken the first steps in defining the level of antibody in a persons’ blood necessary to protect them from infection for six months. Furthermore, by comparing the antibody levels we have found in dentists to those contained in widely available reference material produced by the World Health Organization, we hope the protective level we found can be easily confirmed and compared by other laboratories.”

Corresponding author Professor Thomas Dietrich, of the University of Birmingham’s School of Dentistry, adds: “Critically, only 5.3% of the cohort developed an antibody response that exceeded this threshold of 147.6 IU/ml following the first wave of the UK pandemic.

“This suggests that natural infection alone is unlikely to generate meaningful, durable herd immunity.”

Co-corresponding author Iain Chapple, Professor of Periodontology at the University of Birmingham and Consultant in Restorative Dentistry at Birmingham Community Healthcare Trust, adds: “Dental professionals are thought to be at high risk of exposure to SARS-CoV-2 because they routinely operate within patients’ aerodigestive tract and regularly carry out aerosol-generating procedures that result in the production of airborne particles.

“Through our research, we have clearly shown that dental professionals were at increased occupational risk of exposure to SARS-CoV-2 prior to the new PHE guidance on PPE. The occupational health measures that have been put in place in general dental practice as a consequence of COVID-19 appear to remove that increased risk, however, this will need to be thoroughly investigated to see if they have successfully interrupted transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and other respiratory viruses.”

Co-corresponding author Professor Alex Richter, also of the University of Birmingham, said: “This is the first time the occupational risk of exposure to a potentially fatal respiratory virus has been studied in a large dental cohort.

“It is important that we now progress our research to ensure we have an understanding of how people are protected from re-infection with COVID-19 following natural infection and vaccination.

“The nature and duration of immunity in these cohorts will be critical to understand as the COVID-19 pandemic progresses, particularly with respect to the efficacy of vaccination strategies -single-dose, multiple-doses, vaccine combinations – and in relation to novel viral variants of concern.”

TUC: Employers are “massively under-reporting” Covid deaths

Employers claim just 2.5% of working-age Covid deaths are from exposure to Coronavirus at work
System for reporting workplace deaths and infections is “letting bad bosses off the hook”, says TUC
Under-reporting has badly undermined health and safety regulation and enforcement during the pandemic

The number of people who have died from exposure to Covid at work is being “massively under-reported” by employers, according to a new TUC report published yesterday (Sunday).

The report highlights a huge discrepancy between Covid work-related deaths reported by employers and data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and Public Health England.

Between April 2020 and April 2021 the ONS reported that 15,263 people of working age died from Covid. But according to reports filed by employers just 387 (2.5 per cent) of these deaths came from workers contracting Covid at work.

The union body says this under-reporting has badly undermined health and safety regulation enforcement during the pandemic with employers less likely to face action from regulators for putting staff at risk.

Under-reporting in at-risk sectors

The TUC’s report shows that in sectors with high numbers of deaths during the pandemic – like food production and transport – only a small fraction of deaths have been reported as work-related by employers.

Figures from the ONS show that between March 2020 and December 2020 more than 600 people working in the transport sector died.

But according to reports filed by employers (over the longer period of April 2020 to April 2021) just 10 deaths in the transport sector were work-related.

And figures from the ONS show that 63 food production workers died between March 2020 and December 2020.

But according to data supplied by employers (over the longer period of April 2020 to April 2021) just three of these deaths were the result of work.

The TUC believes the true number of work-related deaths in these and other sectors are much higher, especially considering the high number of breaches of safety protocols we have seen during the pandemic and the high numbers of outbreaks.

Reporting system “letting bad bosses off the hook”

Employers are required by law to report deaths, injuries and illnesses that take place at work or in connection with work.

This is done through a mechanism called RIDDOR (The Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 2013) which logs work-related deaths, illnesses and injuries for the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).

But under the current reporting system employers are given “free rein” to decide whether a Covid-19 diagnosis is the result of occupational exposure or from exposure outside of work premises.

The TUC says this loophole has led to employers not reporting the true scale of Covid work-related deaths and infections to the HSE, despite this information being vital to containing the spread of the virus.

Enforcement crisis

The TUC says that for the HSE to do its job effectively it must possess an accurate and up-to-date picture of where and when work-related deaths and infections are taking place.

But during the pandemic it has only been provided with very partial information from employers.

This has prevented the HSE from carrying out potentially urgent inspections and ensuring employers take the necessary action to keep workers and the public safe, says the report.

TUC analysis shows that just 1 in 218 workplaces has been inspected by the HSE (between March 2020 and April 2021) and not one single employer has been prosecuted for putting staff at risk.

The union body says this “crisis of regulation and enforcement” has allowed bad bosses to get away with flagrant labour rights abuses – adding that the pandemic has highlighted Britain’s enforcement system’s long-standing deficiencies.

New approach needed to health and safety

As well as calling for improvements in the way work-related delated deaths and infections are reported, the union body says government must reverse cuts to the HSE of the past decade, which it says left the country “under-prepared and vulnerable” to the pandemic.

The last ten years has seen real term cuts of 50 per cent to the HSE budget, on top of local authority budgets being slashed.

There has also been a dramatic decline in inspections. There were 27 per cent fewer HSE inspections carried out in the UK in 2019 than 2011, amounting to a fall of over 5,700 a year.

TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “Everybody deserves to be safe at work. But this pandemic has exposed a crisis in health and safety regulation and enforcement.

“Employers have massively under-reported Covid work-related deaths and infections. This has made it much harder for regulators to track where outbreaks are happening and allowed bad bosses to get away with flagrant labour rights abuses.

“It’s staggering that not a single employer has been prosecuted for putting workers at risk of contracting Covid-19.

“The government must fix the deficiencies in how workplace deaths, illnesses and injuries are reported. The current system is letting bosses off the hook.

“And ministers must fund enforcement bodies properly so they can recruit and train qualified workplace inspectors, inspect more workplaces, and prosecute companies who don’t keep their workers safe.”

A copy of the report can be found at: https://www.tuc.org.uk/sites/default/files/2021-05/Underreporting%20of%20RIDDOR%20report%20-%20May%2021.pdf.

UK government downplaying Covid-19 workplace risk, report warns

New research from think tank, the Institute of Employment Rights (IER), has found the risk of Covid-19 transmission in the workplace remains significant and is being dangerously downplayed by the UK government’s light-touch approach.

HSE and Covid at work: a case of regulatory failure is written by 11 specialists in occupational health and safety and labour law, including academics conducting empirical research into workplace risk factors throughout the pandemic.

The team, from England, Scotland and Wales, carried out a comprehensive review of the latest data on workplace transmission and the response of the government and Health and Safety Executive (HSE) to mitigating that risk. Their report identifies a serious mismatch between the risk to workers’ health and the government’s claims to make workplaces “Covid-secure”.

The role of work in transmitting the disease was recognised from the outset of the pandemic. In May 2020, the Office for National Statistics identified 17 high-risk occupations and ‘clusters’ of cases quickly emerged in a wide range of sectors from public services to food processing and retail.

Public Health England (PHE) figures have since revealed the highest-risk workplaces were offices, which accounted for more outbreaks in the second half of 2020 than supermarkets, construction sites, warehouses, restaurants and cafes combined.

Workplace infections account for a significant proportion of all Covid cases. An analysis of PHE data conducted by Professor Rory O’Neill, one of the co-authors of HSE and Covid at work, revealed that 40% of people testing positive for Covid-19 reported prior ‘workplace or education’ activity.

Meanwhile, a survey of call centre workers by co-author Professor Phil Taylor revealed that over one in three (35.4%) were seated less than two metres away from their colleagues in contravention of social distancing rules. This is despite a warning from the government’s own SAGE advisors that reducing social distancing to one metre rather than two could increase transmission ten-fold.

In May 2020, the government declared workplaces “Covid-secure” and reassured workers that this would be enforced through a £14m package for HSE ‘spot checks’. But IER’s analysis found strong evidence that risk was not sufficiently mitigated in workplaces because Covid-19 rules were not adequately enforced.

The IER’s analysis of the government’s strategy reveals an underfunded, light-touch approach through an understaffed agency which failed to regulate the risk to workers and, by logical extension, to communities, including carers, pupils and students in education and their parents.

The magnitude of this risk has since been tragically borne out by large workplace outbreaks such as that seen at the DVLA’s Swansea offices, while the government’s underwhelming response is reflected in the complete absence of prosecutions of employers known to be breaking Covid rules.

Andy McDonald, Shadow Secretary for Employment Rights and Protections, said: “In a time of national crisis it is more important than ever that the government’s actions are held up to scrutiny. The findings of this report are deeply concerning – if health and safety laws and Covid-19 rules are not enforced, they are not worth the paper they are written on.

“When a deadly disease sweeps the country we need worker protections more than ever, yet the government has effectively shielded employers from prosecution even while coming down hard on individual citizens who break the same rules. We have seen the tragic results of under-regulated workplaces in outbreaks across the country, including at the DVLA offices in Swansea.

“The workers affected – and those in our emergency services and NHS who fought to save their lives – deserve answers as to how this was allowed to happen.”

Professor Phil James, Professor of Employment Relations at Middlesex University and editor of the report, said: “When the pandemic was declared on 11 March 2020, the government had to decide how it would balance the protection of public health with the protection of the economy. A year later, our analysis suggests it got that balance wrong. Our jobs are among the most important features of our lives, but they are not worth our lives, nor are they worth the lives of colleagues, family and friends.

“This light-touch approach to the regulation of businesses during the worst pandemic we have seen in 100 years must now be subject to a major independent public inquiry to understand what went wrong and how we can do better. It is vital that we learn from the failings of workplace regulation over the last year, because this pandemic proves that workers’ health is also public health – it benefits us all.”

Lord John Hendy QC, Chair of the IER and a co-author of the report, said: “Something has gone very badly wrong when enforcement action has been taken against over 40,000 members of the public and holidaymakers are threatened with ten years in jail but employers known to have put thousands of people at risk are getting off scot free.

“There has been health and safety legislation on the UK’s statute book for over 200 years. The current regulations are well known and could have been reasonably and effectively applied to protect workers. They were not.

“Had employers been reminded of their legal duties and these laws enforced through robust inspections and effective penalties, workplaces could have been made a lot safer than COVID-19 has shown them to be.”

Carolyn Jones, Director of the IER, said: “The government and HSE has neglected perhaps the richest resource at their fingertips in their exclusion of the UK’s nearly 100,000 trained trade union health and safety representatives from their ‘Covid-secure’ strategy.

“Several comparative economies have adopted a co-enforcement approach whereby the State and trade unions work together to ensure the health and safety of those at work and the models that work well internationally should be considered in building a similar approach in the UK.

“In the second stage of our health and safety project, we will take evidence from representatives across the economy and society to understand how better cooperation between all concerned can make a difference in the future.”

Key factors identified in the report

Severe lack of resources

Inspectors were themselves locked down when ‘spot checks’ were announced. Demonstrating the severity of the risk to workers, the HSE barred Inspectors from making workplace visits because of the danger to them of making such visits. As a result, ‘spot checks’ were conducted by phone despite 67% of people in a YouGov survey favouring random in-person checks.
Austerity. Following a 58% funding cut over the last 10 years, which forced the HSE to reduce its staffing levels by 36%, there were too few inspectors to perform ‘spot checks’ on the nation’s 5.5m health and safety dutyholders. The £14m of extra funding barely made a dent in the nearly £1000m lost by the HSE during 10 years of government austerity and covered just 0.5% of HSE activity.

A decline in workplace inspections even as risk increased

Workplace inspections fell rather than increased during the pandemic. The number of workplace inspections completed between May and September 2020 was 40% lower than during the same period in 2019. Even care homes, where the virus presented an extremely lethal threat, were not adequately inspected, with only eight having received a visit by September 2020.
Funding rules forced public money into private hands. The HSE was not permitted to use any of the £14m extra funding to train new inspectors, so more than half of this money was siphoned off to private companies to ‘inspect’ employers. In fact, this was done from call centres staffed by untrained workers who made 15-minute, scripted phone-calls to employers. The ineffectiveness of this strategy was evidenced by the findings of a TUC survey revealing very clear breaches of the law in over a third of workplaces. Meanwhile, the UK’s richest health and safety resource – nearly 100,000 trained trade union health and safety reps – were not invited to participate.

A light-touch approach to employers and the law

No legal standing for “Covid-secure” guidance. In direct contrast to the various emergency laws made in relation to social activities and other forms of pandemic control, the measures employers were asked to take were not backed by the force of law. Instead, the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and the HSE issued ‘guidance’.
Legal duties to workers consistently downplayed. The IER’s report identifies two Acts of Parliament and seven sets of regulations relevant to the duties owed to workers, but found these were barely mentioned in the guidance given to businesses. As a result, the guidance failed to emphasise the legal obligations of employers to protect the health and safety of workers.

Recommendations

Concluding this initial report, the team made the following recommendations:

The urgent launch of a major independent public inquiry into the future of the regulation of safety and health at work in the UK, with a focus on creating a regulatory system, including an effective regulator, that will better protect the health and safety of all workers in the UK, now and in the future.
A significant increase in investment in the HSE to promote stronger enforcement of legal protections, thereby improving their effectiveness.
A comprehensive review of enforcement strategies employed by the HSE and local authorities, including a critical examination of the – currently rare and diminishing – use of legal sanctions.
Ensure the political independence of the HSE by considering its reconstitution in line with the United Nations’ Paris Principles, which require the involvement of representatives from civil society and the ringfencing of adequate funds to prevent government from imposing its political beliefs through budgetary controls.
Strengthen trade union safety representatives’ rights to access workplaces, undertake preventative work and support the enforcement of the law, such as through the issuing of improvement notices and the bringing of private prosecutions.
Enhance existing safety representative rights relating to the provision of information, consultation, and training (including paid time off to undertake it).
Reform the current statutory framework for health and safety at work to better protect workers in modern, more casualised, forms of employment, including those found in the gig economy.
Reform and enhance current laws permitting workers to stop work in conditions of serious and imminent danger, – provisions derived from EU law and provided under Sections 44 and 100 of the Employment Rights Act,.
Consider adopting international models of co-enforced oversight, that involve State regulators working alongside trade unions and other civil society organisations to monitor and enforce compliance with legal standards.
Explore the value and application of forms of supply chain regulation under which powerful supply chain actors have duties to ensure that they support effective health and safety management and compliance in supplier organisations. This would, for instance, would make fashion retailers buying from dangerous Leicester garment factories partly liable for the dangerous conditions there.

The team behind the report will now establish a Committee of Inquiry that will take evidence from relevant parties to understand how reforms to health and safety legislation could provide better protection for workers in modern workplaces.

Call Centre Workers Still Putting Their Lives On The Line

Covid-19 still a major threat to call centre workers’ health

Workers call for more action to protect staff

Covid-19 still presents a major threat to contact centre workers and action needs to be taken to protect them, according to a letter from the STUC to the Scottish Government.

The letter is a response to the work of the Scottish Government’s Working Group for Contact Centres and urges them to audit Scottish call centres and ensure employers are following guidelines and revising risk assessments.

The letter comes after new variants of the disease have been confirmed and a major outbreak in DVLA Swansea confirms the danger presented in large workplaces. The letter argues that the conditions in sealed buildings with mechanical heating and ventilation systems magnify the problem.

The letter has the backing of Call Centre Collective- a trade union-backed grassroots organisation formed in response to the pandemic- who have organised a petition in support.

Craig Anderson from Call Centre Collective said: “The Scottish Government needs to listen and take active steps to protect workers. We know there are some employers cutting corners and taking unnecessary risks with the safety of their staff.

“It would be unforgivable, after seeing what happened in Swansea, if no lessons are learned from it. We urge anyone who with an interest in protecting workers to sign our petition supporting the STUC’s letter and keep up the pressure.”

Roz Foyer, STUC General Secretary, added, “Throughout this pandemic one of the largest sources of complaints to unions and MSPs has been from call centre workers.

“The new evidence on transmission and the risks inherent with new variants makes it absolutely essential that we see action now.”

Usdaw welcomes Protection of Workers Bill progress

Shopworkers’ trade union Usdaw has welcomed further scrutiny of the Protection of Workers (Retail and Age-restricted Goods and Services) (Scotland) Bill at yesterday’s Economy, Energy and Fair Work Committee meeting.

Usdaw is caling for the Bill to complete Stage 1 and progress to Stage 2 of the legislative process, so that the Parliament can give consideration to amendments.

Promoted by Daniel Johnson MSP (Labour, Edinburgh Southern), the new law would protect retail workers from threats and abuse when enforcing the law on the purchase of age-restricted products.

Today’s meeting heard evidence from Daniel Johnson and allowed members of the committee to question him on his proposed new legislation.

Stewart Forrest,Usdaw’s Scottish Divisional Officer, says: “We welcome the committee’s scrutiny of this Bill. This proposed new law is really important to our members and tackles a key issue of concern for them.

“Every minute of every day another Scottish shopworker is abused, threatened or assaulted; often in the course of them enforcing the law, so they deserve the protection of the law.

“It was clear from today’s meeting that there is strong support for the intentions of the Bill, albeit there are questions about the details. So we would welcome the Bill progressing to the next stages of the legislative process when amendments can be fully considered.

“Throughout the Coronavirus outbreak shopworkers have been on the frontline of ensuring that Scotland remains fed. It is clear that shopworkers are at an increased risk of contracting Covid-19, yet they have continued to go to work and help respond to the crisis sweeping the nation.

“Despite this key role, we have seen abuse, threats and violence against shop staff double during the Coronavirus emergency.

“However abuse of shopworkers is not a problem confined to these times of crisis and, in our view, the current legal provisions do not sufficiently protect them.

“The Scottish Government has indicated they too support the intentions of the Bill and will engage in the details of it. We hope that will lead to a change in the law to better protect shopworkers.”