In this whitepaper:
1. What has 2025 looked like?
2. But how might these shape 2026?
1. What has 2025 looked like?
As highlighted in our November white paper, from a statistics perspective, 2025 was a mixed bag. Whereas we saw a welcome decline in, work-related fatal injuries, RIDDOR-reportable injuries and numbers of reported musculoskeletal injuries (although still too many of course), cases of stress (and other mental health conditions) and the cost and lost time due to injury and ill health have all increased.
New guidance and legislation, this year has seen those managing buildings and estates affected in different ways with:
- The enactment of Martyn’s Law - the Terrorism (Protection of Premises) Act 2025 with the onus it places on public venues to assess and mitigate the risk of terrorist attacks;
- Guidance on fire doors was produced, clarifying the requirements of The Fire Safety (England) Regulations 2022;
- The requirement for health and safety considerations to be integrated into all stages of the public procurement process through the Procurement Act 2023;
- ADR 2025 regulations, covering how dangerous goods are classified, packaged, labelled and transported by road (including items such as lithium-ion batteries and asbestos);
- The Separation of Waste (England) Regulations 2025 - aiming to reduce contamination and improve waste handling safety by allowing the combined collection of certain recyclable materials; and
- Employment Rights Act 2025: A key fundamental part of the Government’s ‘Plan to Make Work Pay’, the Act looks to prioritise the fairness, equality and wellbeing of workers and covers a host of areas including hybrid work.
Other influences have included aspects such as:
- Workstyle, which has and will continue, to be an area organisations need to develop;
- Technology and AI, much has been talked about this in workplace and compliance management, although, its deployment has been more targeted/restricted so far;
- Workforce re-skilling/training, particularly with reference to the point AI point above; and
- Governance and reporting, we’ve seen a significant further rise in director and governor training over the last year and don’t think this is going to change. As ESG reporting is changing from a voluntary, compliance-focused activities to a more strategic, non-financial risk-based approach, considering technological and sustainable integration.
2. But how might these shape 2026?
It is likely that much of what we’ve seen in 2025 will run over into 2026, and in some cases beyond. Notwithstanding this, there are still things that need to be done, not least where agendas change, be they governmental, enforcer or organisational. Knowing your current position accurately, and company health and safety appetite is key, to how you approach your activities in 2026. Some of the areas you may want/need to consider are:
Wellbeing – with a focus on mental health provision and management in the workplace, particularly around, stress, burnout and psychological safety. We are seeing enforcers wanting a wider approach on the causes of workplace stress, depression and anxiety and not just a symptoms-based approach. So, expect increased scrutiny on the proactive processes organisations have in place, to tackle stress, burnout, and workload management.
End users are likely to become more demanding too, in how they want to see their employer approach wellbeing, this will certainly include the workplace and aspects such as indoor environment quality.
Workstyle - the focus on hybrid styles of working will continue to challenge organisations, not least in their workplace(s) management, company culture and communication. With space becoming a factor again for some (more people in the office for more of the time), managing real estate should not be excluded either.
The management of ergonomics, non-office-based safety and people will be affected, and organisations should be reviewing their processes to ensure the standards for elements such as home-based ergonomic setups (DSE assessments), fire safety, work equipment and information security.
AI and technology – we already can measure and monitor more in our workplaces than ever before, this will continue with the technology and engines driving it becoming increasingly smarter. What those responsible for managing premises and buildings need to establish is, what are the critical areas they need to cover and how they are going to deliver these? Smart data capture and usage is essential if we are not to possibly drown in the data and so lose the potential it offers.
Pick your digital tools wisely and carefully, look at the provenance of the solution provider to make sure they’ve understood the need, and the solution properly and compliantly, not just widened the scope of a system to cater for further options.
Buildings and building safety – as well as the ongoing and developing building/fire safety requirements, new legislation such as Martyn’s Law and the Building Safety Levy, will come into play. Again, the scope for these will be targeted initially, but we will no doubt see scope extension and scope creep occur too at some point. Understand where you are in relation to any new changes, and if and where the current legislation may affect you in the future and so what your compliance would look like.
Compliance management – any future changes cannot be at the expense of your existing compliance, so a targeted and a risk-based approach to your management must be its basis. With enforcers pushing for greater employer accountability, your processes need to reflect this too.
Up to date, accurate and regularly reviewed health and safety risk registers will be a fundamental element and these should be discussed and agreed with the board. Matching policies, activity, information, processes and monitoring to these risks in turn will be the basis for your compliance.
Proactive risk management needs to see a shift from reactive fixes to early identification through intelligent risk identification and management, and clearer accountability for duty holders, responsible persons and others involved in controlling these risks. Equally assessing vulnerabilities and emerging risks, for example, changing legislation and lithium-ion batteries, to name but two, are seeing insurers and enforcers requiring organisations to understand and effectively mitigate these risks.
Assurity Consulting is the UK’s leading independent consultancy specialising in workplace health, safety and environmental solutions. As your partner in compliance management you will reap the benefit of our more than 35 years’ experience of helping customers across a range of different sectors – manage their compliance responsibilities as effectively as possible. If you need any help with your health, safety or environmental compliance, or if you would like more information on the services Assurity Consulting offer, please get in touch.