Offshore oil and gas is a major hazard industry. The Hazardous Installations Directorate is the operational arm responsible for major hazards, with Offshore Division being responsible for the offshore sector.

HSE's plan of work for the offshore industry targets the key priorities identified in the Revitalising Health and Safety (RHS) strategy and additional priority topics identified by HSE's Hazardous Installations Directorate (HID).

During offshore visits HSE inspectors will be seeking to ensure that management systems are in place to address health and safety issues.

Operational work includes:

• Safety case assessment
• Inspection
• Investigation
• Enforcement
• Provision of advice, guidance and information
• Research and development
• Influencing technical standards
• Operational policy and systems
• Operational support to frontline activities

OSD undertakes a significant amount of intervention through a series of projects that target specific issues and contribute towards the HSC/E strategy for the workplace. Details of the 2007/08 programme.

Revitalising Health & Safety

The Revitalising Health and Safety (RHS) strategy launched In June 2000 by the Government and the Health and Safety Commission (HSC) aims to raise the profile of Health & Safety at work.

A number of challenging targets have been set for achievement by 2010:

• 30% Reduction in the number of working days lost due to accidents & ill health
• 20% Reduction in the incidence of ill health
• 10% Reduction in the number of accidents

Industry Targets

Industry targets have been set to deliver improvements and contribute to overall RHS targets, to summarise:

• Manned Installations to be proactively inspected at least annually
• 97% of incidents classified as serious enough for mandatory investigation to be Investigated
• 95% of valid complaints to be investigated
• 50% reduction in significant hydrocarbon releases to be achieved through Identification of common failure modes, increased awareness of poor performance & Identification of root causes/effective remedies
• 25% reduction in events with the potential to give rise to a collision to be achieved through targeted investigation, development of new guidance & inspection of operations against the resulting industry guidance
• 100% of submitted safety cases to be assessed prior to scheduled date for commencement or continuation of operations. (The Offshore Installations (Safety Case) Regulations 2005 (SCR05) requires that an offshore installation cannot operate without a safety case accepted by HSE. The assessment of safety cases is essential to provide the assurance that duty holders have in place arrangements to ensure that the relevant statutory provisions will be complied with.)

Further information on these programmes and other key activities and Offshore priority areas is available from Hazardous Installations Division (HID) Operating Plan