CSCS General Responsibilities & Risk Assessment Questions
Your legal duties on site, risk assessments and method statements.
These questions cover general responsibilities & risk assessment for the CITB Health, Safety and Environment (HS&E) test, the exam UK construction workers pass to get a CSCS card.
General Responsibilities & Risk Assessment: practice quiz
- 20 questions · 30 minutes · pass mark 90%
- Answers and explanations are shown at the end, with every question to review.
- A fresh 20 questions every time, drawn from all 125 in this topic's bank. Includes 2 select-two questions and 2 picture questions, as in the real test.
- About 90 seconds a question, against about 54 in the real test, so there is time to think.
10 sample General Responsibilities & Risk Assessment questions and answers
These 10 come from the 125 questions the practice quiz above draws from, written out with the correct answer and the reasoning behind it. Read them through when you want to revise rather than test yourself.
1. Under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, how far does an employer's general duty to protect its own employees extend?
Answer: As far as is reasonably practicable, covering health, safety and welfare
- A) Absolutely, so that no employee may ever be harmed under any circumstance
- B) Only to those risks the employer has been warned about in writing first
- C) Only as far as the employer's liability insurance policy agrees to cover
- D) As far as is reasonably practicable, covering health, safety and welfare (correct answer)
Why: Section 2(1) makes it the duty of every employer to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all employees. The duty is qualified, so it is not absolute, but it is also not limited to written warnings or to whatever an insurer will pay for.
2. As well as taking reasonable care, what else does section 7 of the 1974 Act require of an employee?
Answer: To co-operate with the employer so its legal duties can be carried out
- A) To co-operate with the employer so its legal duties can be carried out (correct answer)
- B) To pay towards the cost of safety equipment issued to them for the job
- C) To report faults to the enforcing authority instead of the employer
- D) To write their own risk assessment before starting any unfamiliar task
Why: Section 7(b) requires an employee to co-operate with the employer, or any other person with a duty, so far as is necessary to enable that duty or requirement to be performed or complied with. Writing risk assessments and paying for equipment are not employee duties.
3. When assessing risks to a young person, what must an employer take particular account of under the Management Regulations 1999?
Answer: Their inexperience, their lack of awareness of risk and their immaturity
- A) The hours of unpaid overtime that they say they are willing to work
- B) Their examination results and the qualifications they gained at school
- C) Their inexperience, their lack of awareness of risk and their immaturity (correct answer)
- D) Their height and weight measured against the average adult on that site
Why: Regulation 3(5)(a) requires particular account to be taken of the inexperience, lack of awareness of risks and immaturity of young persons, alongside factors such as workplace layout and the training given. Exam results and physical size are not the statutory test.
4. A labourer is sent to work alone on a remote part of the site. Who keeps the legal responsibility for the labourer's health and safety?
Answer: The employer, because the duty cannot be passed to the lone worker
- A) The employer, because the duty cannot be passed to the lone worker (correct answer)
- B) The labourer, because nobody else is there to supervise the work
- C) The labourer and employer equally, once the lone working is agreed
- D) The site client, because the work is being done on its land
Why: HSE's lone working guide says the employer's responsibilities for workers cannot be transferred to any other person, including people who work alone. The worker still has their own duty of reasonable care, but the employer's duty stays with the employer.
5. A new starter says they used the same type of saw at their last job and can start on it now. What does HSE say?
Answer: Never assume they can use it safely, even with experience elsewhere
- A) Never assume they can use it safely, even with experience elsewhere (correct answer)
- B) Let them start straight away, as experience elsewhere proves skill
- C) Let them start if another worker watches from the far side of site
- D) Let them start if they sign to say they have used one before
Why: HSE's work equipment leaflet says never assume an employee can use work equipment safely, especially if they have just started work, even if they have used similar equipment elsewhere.
6. HSE sets out five steps for managing risk. In what order do they come?
Answer: Identify hazards, assess risks, control them, record findings, review
- A) Identify hazards, assess risks, control them, record findings, review (correct answer)
- B) Record findings, identify hazards, review, control risks, assess risks
- C) Control risks, identify hazards, record findings, assess risks, review
- D) Assess risks, review, identify hazards, record findings, control risks
Why: HSE lists the steps as identify hazards, assess the risks, control the risks, record your findings and review the controls.
7. A school pupil below the minimum school leaving age asks for a job on a construction site. What does HSE say?
Answer: They must not be employed there, except on work experience
- A) They must not be employed there, except on work experience (correct answer)
- B) They may be employed there if a parent signs a consent form
- C) They may be employed there during the school holidays only
- D) They may be employed there if they only carry light materials
Why: HSE says children below the minimum school leaving age must not be employed in industrial workplaces such as factories and construction sites, except on work experience.
8. Under PUWER 1998, for which operations may work equipment be used?
Answer: Only those operations and conditions for which it is suitable
- A) Only those operations and conditions for which it is suitable (correct answer)
- B) Any operation, provided the user wears gloves and eye protection
- C) Operations the supervisor approves, in the conditions on the day
- D) Only operations listed on the hire agreement, in any conditions
Why: Regulation 4(3) requires every employer to ensure that work equipment is used only for operations for which, and under conditions for which, it is suitable.
9. A contractor hires a power tool from a hire shop for a six-week job. What does HSE say the contractor should do?
Answer: Take steps to make sure it stays safe to use for the whole hire period
- A) Take steps to make sure it stays safe to use for the whole hire period (correct answer)
- B) Nothing, as the hire shop stays responsible for it until it is returned
- C) Have it formally tested by an electrician daily, before it is switched on
- D) Fit its own dated pass label to the tool before it is first switched on
Why: HSE recommends that hire firms formally inspect and test equipment before each hire, and says the person hiring it should also take appropriate steps to make sure it remains safe to use throughout the hire period.
10. Where must the approved health and safety law poster be displayed for it to meet the 1989 Regulations?
Answer: Somewhere reasonably accessible to the employee at work, and easily seen and read
- A) Somewhere reasonably accessible to the employee at work, and easily seen and read (correct answer)
- B) Inside the site manager's own locked office, behind the desk where it stays clean
- C) On the outside of the site hoarding, facing the public footpath and road
- D) At the company's head office, however far that is from the site
Why: Regulation 4(1)(a) requires the poster to be at a place reasonably accessible to the employee while at work, and in such a position as to be easily seen and read.
What this topic covers in the CSCS test
Almost every other topic in the test rests on two ideas from this one: everybody on site carries a legal duty, and every task gets planned before it starts. This section covers who is responsible for what under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, and how a risk assessment turns a hazard into a job that can be done safely. Get it right and a lot of the rest of the syllabus follows from it.
- Employer duties under section 2 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974
- Worker duties under sections 7 and 8, including not misusing anything provided for safety
- The difference between a hazard and a risk, and what a risk assessment is for
- The general principles of prevention, and why PPE ranks last among controls
- Safe systems of work: the health and safety policy, the construction phase plan, permits to work
- Reporting hazards, refusing untrained work, and stopping when conditions change
- Condition and inspection of hand tools and portable powered equipment
Key facts worth memorising
- The employer holds the main duty
- Section 2 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 requires every employer to ensure the health, safety and welfare of employees so far as is reasonably practicable.
- Your duty as a worker
- Section 7 requires you to take reasonable care for yourself and for anyone affected by what you do, and to co-operate with your employer, but it does not require you to write risk assessments.
- Section 8 stands on its own
- No person may intentionally or recklessly interfere with or misuse anything provided in the interests of health, safety or welfare, so removing a guard is an offence even if nobody is hurt.
- Hazard is not risk
- A hazard is anything with the potential to cause harm; the risk is how likely that harm is and how serious it would be.
- Five or more employees
- At five or more employees the employer must record the significant findings of the risk assessment and must have a written health and safety policy.
- Collective controls beat individual ones
- Schedule 1 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 requires risks to be combated at source and collective protective measures to be given priority over individual ones.
- 110 V tools on site
- HSE recommends 110 V portable site equipment gets a user check weekly, a formal visual inspection monthly, and a combined inspection and test before first use on site and then every three months.
What people get wrong
Producing the risk assessment is part of my job as a worker.
The duty to make a suitable and sufficient assessment sits with the employer, and with self-employed people for their own work. Your job is to work to it and to speak up when the job on the ground stops matching it.
Being self-employed means the law does not apply to me.
Regulation 3(2) of the Management Regulations requires a self-employed person to assess the risks to themselves and to anyone else affected by their work.
If I can see a hazard I should just fix it myself.
Report it to your supervisor first. Something you are not trained or authorised to touch may need isolating, a permit, or a proper repair, and a quick fix can leave a worse hazard behind.
Experienced trades trusting each other counts as a safe system of work.
A safe system of work is documented: the risk assessment, the method statement, the permit to work and the construction phase plan. Trust is not a control measure.
Answering these questions in the test
When a question asks what you should do, look for the answer that stops the unsafe activity and tells somebody with authority. The test almost never rewards pressing on, improvising or sorting it out quietly. Watch the wording carefully in this section, because several questions list three genuine worker duties and one employer duty and ask you to spot the odd one out, and others ask which answer is false rather than true. If two options both look reasonable, choose the one that removes the hazard over the one that manages around it, because that ranking runs through the whole syllabus.
Background reading
Drilling the questions tells you what you are getting wrong. It does not always tell you why. For this topic that is covered in The 5 Steps of Risk Assessment. The five steps you were taught on your induction, and the five HSE actually publishes now.
Sources
Written from the following. Where a figure could not be verified against one of these, it has been left out rather than approximated. Our sources and methodology explains how we date and re-check them. Spotted something wrong? Report an error and we will fix it.
- legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1974/37/part/I/crossheading/general-duties
- legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1999/3242/regulation/3/made
- legislation.gov.uk/uksi/1999/3242/schedule/1/made
- hse.gov.uk/simple-health-safety/risk/steps-needed-to-manage-risk.htm
- hse.gov.uk/simple-health-safety/policy/index.htm
- hse.gov.uk/electricity/electricequip.htm
Topics that come up alongside general responsibilities & risk assessment
Ready for the real thing?
When you are scoring 90% or better here, take a CSCS mock test for Operatives under exam conditions, then how to book the CSCS test. Still under 90%? Pick another topic from the free CSCS practice test.