News Archive

• 2007-02-02
  The decline of erudition and the rise of commodity
• 2006-07-14
  UK Ltd spends more on compliance than on paying its people.
• 2006-05-15
  The Future’s Bright – But It’s Not Legal.
• 2006-04-13
  Safety Compliance help is available in spades for UK Businesses.
• 2006-04-01
  The UK Health & Safety Market: Consulting, Training, Advisory, Content and Computing Services is a new Market Report published in April 2006, price £895.
• 2005-11-14
  With the Red Tape tide rising, why are Personal Injury cases, Employment Tribunals and HSE prosecutions dropping?

Safety Compliance help is available in spades for UK Businesses.
2006-04-13

It’s official - UK Businesses will spend more than half a billion on health & safety compliance services in 2006.

Five hundred million, six hundred and seventy thousand, nine hundred and thirty six pounds and 38 pence (£500,670,936.38) to be precise. 

A.R.K. know because they have counted it. They track every specialist consultancy, insurer, publisher, trainer, software developer and institute in health & safety services in the UK, and have done for the past 10 years.

The main driver for safety demand is the scale and scope of regulation coming from Westminster and Brussels. A.R.K. research shows that each year the impact of regulatory pressures has been ramping up to over 9 billion currently, and this driver has created a compliance services market of which health & safety services is one of the largest market sectors.

Companies face many choices in dealing with regulations.  Ignoring them is still common, primarily through companies assuming they are doing enough already (usually mistakenly).  Other solutions include building up in-house teams to cope with accounting, company secretarial, data protection, employment/HR,product liability, trading standards, and safety issues.  Many more firms are also seeking specialist outside help now ranging from insurance cover, advisory backup, training, consultancy, project management, publications, and increasingly outsourcing the management of the issue altogether.

A.R.K.’s unique research into this sector explains that:

“Health & Safety is now a major market in its own right – it’s not a specialism within industry sectors such as construction, food, or environmental services - it takes a lot more than insurance to cover the issues - and even expert in-house teams need a lot of support” claims David R Johnston, CEO of A.R.K. Business Analysis.

The A.R.K. Market Report tracks every supplier in the UK with over £1m in sales in safety and health compliance and many more small suppliers as well.  Data is tracked from 1995 and projected to 2010. Specialisms such as asbestos management systems, CDM, CoSHH/Reach, food safety, fire certification, hygiene, occupational health, and traditional “slips, trips and accidents” are tracked and leading players and new entrants are identified.

“This is one of the most vibrant markets in the UK B2B services sector currently”, claims David Johnston. “Consolidation is inevitable, but most firms are simply struggling to keep up with the high growth potential. The good news is that both the quality and the variety of service options open to UK companies is high.  Red Tape and compliance may be the bane of management lives throughout the land – but UK businesses are not alone."