The Hazards Campaign

Participants, Delegates and Attendance
573 delegates attended Hazards 2005, including workshop facilitators and speakers; there were 197 female which is 34.4% of the total, and 376 male delegates. This is the same proportion of women to men as last year. Almost two-thirds (63.7%) were new delegates to Hazards – many of the 208 recidivists were workshop facilitators and other repeat offenders. We had the usual difficulties to contend with – promises to send delegate forms that never materialised; forms that never arrived; cheques missing from envelopes; people applying the day before saying they had been on holiday for a fortnight (?) and a couple of commercial organisations wanting to muscle in as delegates and exhibitors who were rebuffed. 7 substitute delegates attended.

The evaluation forms returned this year and other comments were overwhelmingly positive. (but see below)

Conference Organisation and Publicity
We cut the number of forms that were distributed to 22,000 this year, and took an advert in Hazards. A couple of people still complained they had received multiple copies of the leaflets, but there is nothing we can do about that. Lots of people participated as pre-conference helpers, stewards and on registration at the event, facilitators, speakers, and session chairs; many of these multi-tasked as delegates as well, and a number did more than one job. As in previous years, the vast majority of delegates reported that the organisation matters had been excellent, although there were still some comments that it was not as well publicised as it could have been, and at least one UNISON Branch H&S officer said she had not seen any information from the union. If anyone has any ideas how we could improve publicity, let us know.

Organisations wanting exhibition space were a little tardy in confirming their needs; it was good to see NATFHE TU Education publicity this year, and the Bookmarx man was highly delighted, having sold numerous copies of “The Communist Manifesto”. Leeds Postcards stall was also refreshing - at least two people commented that they thought it was no longer going.

Venue and Accommodation
As in previous years, we had a few complaints about the standard of rooms; we made some changes and did what we could to resolve these where we were informed. One regular delegate commented that “My room was a bit grotty, but as I was as ‘networked as a newt’ for most of the time I was in it, it didn’t matter.” In the main, accommodation appears to have been acceptable to the vast majority of delegates. There were also a few complaints that the site was not accessible to people with mobility difficulties and particularly in wheelchairs. One was that the site was too widespread, but we cannot do anything about that; we doubt there is anywhere as compact as the UMIST site. Other access matters have been referred to Leeds University.

While a few delegates made a plea for a return to Manchester, there were also those who thought Leeds had been a good venue, and would be happy to use it again.

Food and Catering
We conducted little “straw polls” amongst delegates during the weekend, and without exception, the quality of the food was reported as excellent. One delegate complained about a queue – we would like to know how to feed almost 600 people at the same time without some kind of queue forming, for goodness sake? A couple of delegates commented that the Saturday evening meal had been too slow, and thought a buffet would be better.

Finance
There were sponsorship donations from 298 trade union organisations, individuals and others. We also had sponsorship in kind for printing appeals and booking forms. One cancellation asked for the delegate fee to be converted into a Hazards magazine subscription for the Branch, which we organised.

There were 24 concessionary places for helpers, speakers, workshop facilitators and guests. One delegate with a concessionary place did not turn up. We also gave a concessionary residential rate to one Hazards Campaign group. The cost of concessions was £3,820, against the budget figure of £4,000 agreed last year. As always, a number of helpers, facilitators and speakers paid the full delegate fee to work for the weekend.

The Programme
In response to criticisms in 2004 that the Saturday was too full and delegates felt under pressure, we decided that the late afternoon session should be for fringe and delegation meetings, or to allow delegates to simply network in a more relaxed manner, “do” the exhibition area etc. Predictably, we had a couple of complaints that the later part of Saturday afternoon was wasted!

Sickness absence monitoring was again the best attended workshop, with stress risk assessments holding up well. Two new workshops, Shiftwork and Older Workers both attracted large numbers. Generally, the workshops designated for new reps recruited well, and the new Communication & negotiating skills picked-up well for a first time. A couple of delegates who attended the VDU’s and Prevention of Health Problems workshop were full of praise for it, and those attending the Backpain workshop had a high-old time feeling each others spines! Below are the workshops and numbers who opted for each.

This year's plenary sessions were universally praised; the general view was that the topics were spot-on; the mix was right, and that the speakers were impressive. With a couple of curmudgeonly comments (“Could have read this in Hazards, nothing new”, and “Same old stuff”), everyone loved Rory, despite a couple of other comments on his sartorial elegance and hirsute appearance. In the campaign debates, opinions were generally positive, although one complained it was more like a lecture than a debate.

We still have not cracked the problem of workshop organisation and delegate’s workshop attendance. Surprisingly, the Sunday morning session appears to have been the best attended. We had a real problem when in order to ensure a room that was of adequate size a workshop was moved, which led to complaints about disabled access. Because we took people up to the final couple of days again, we were so rushed on the day that we stuffed the delegates envelopes that we made a couple of minor errors that resulted in us having to reprint 191 pink cards (a third of the total) and open envelopes and replace them.

Conference Resolution
In the closing plenary session delegates passed the following resolution to the government:

‘The government’s current focus on deregulation is likely to accelerate ‘the race to the bottom’ in terms of health and safety standards.
• Hazards 2005 Conference urges the government to abandon its deregulation fetish. (See Hazards 2005 conference press release)
• Hazards 2005 Conference urges the UK government to use its presidency of the EU to prioritise the improvement of health and safety standards.
• Hazards 2005 Conference urges the government to support the adoption of the five main proposals in the ETUC memorandum dated 28/6/05, to improve the quality of working life in the European Union.
• Hazards 2005 Conference also urges the government to play a more positive role within the ILO to ensure that health and safety improvements take place at a global level.’

This has been sent to David Blunkett, along with an invitation to attend Hazards 2006, and issued as a press release, covered by Health & Safety at Work, LRD, and others. We need to co-ordinate this better next year, and try to ensure that unions distribute it as well.

Thanks We want to record a big “Thank You” to all the people who helped to make the conference the success it was – sponsoring organisations and individuals; publicity distributors; envelope stuffers; badge makers; pack fillers; stewards and helpers; facilitators, speakers; session chairs; University staff from organisers via porters and refectory and hall staff to chefs; stall holders; hazards campaign organisations; trade unions; and, last but not least, the delegates themselves.

Hazards 2005: Participants Organisations