A deadly consensus: worker safety and regulatory degradation under New Labour

Tombs, Steve and Whyte, David (2010). A deadly consensus: worker safety and regulatory degradation under New Labour. British Journal of Criminology, 50(1) pp. 46–65.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/bjc/azp063

Abstract

This paper documents the vulnerability of the UK workplace safety regime to ‘regulatory degradation’. Following a brief overview of this regime, the paper examines the dominant arguments within academic literature on appropriate and feasible regulatory enforcement, arguing that the approaches to regulation thereby advocated have been easily degraded as a result of their compatibility with neo-liberal economic strategy. A subsequent analysis of empirical trends within safety enforcement reveals a virtual collapse of formal enforcement, as political and resource pressures have taken their toll on the regulatory authority. Finally, the paper indicates that the increasing impunity with which employers can kill and injure is particularly problematic as we enter sustained economic recession, and underlines the urgent need for regulatory alternatives.

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