Let’s talk about safety

Companies working in Denmark must involve their employees in the work to safeguard and promote health and safety.

As an employee, you are entitled to have a health and safety representative, who is elected by the employees, if the company you work for has at least five employees, who work for 14 days or more on a worksite in Denmark.

The companies have an obligation to participate in the cross-site health and safety work held by the client’s health and safety manager, such as start-up and safety meetings.

The contractor’s duties

If you are a contractor with a minimum of five employees working for 14 days or more on a building site, you need to set up your own health and safety organisation for the worksite. This creates a framework for continuous dialogue around health and safety on site between management and employees – and it can help to prevent occupational accidents.

The health and safety organisations that generate the best value, are organisations where employees, the health and safety representative and the work supervisor are all in daily dialogue about the work processes and problems which regularly occur.

The client’s duties

As a client, there is a lot you can do to take the lead and ensure constructive and effective health and safety cooperation. For example, you can lay the right foundation to help companies prioritise health and safety cooperation on the construction site by establishing health and safety requirements in the contracts and agreements you conclude with your contractors.

One of the most important factors for good health and safety cooperation on the worksite is for enterprises to participate via their management representatives and health and safety representatives in the safety meetings that you hold as the client.