Section 3-18. Training of safety representatives and members of working environment committees

Safety representatives and members of working environment committees shall receive the training necessary to enable them to perform their duties in a proper manner; see Section 6-5 (1) and Section 7-4 of the Working Environment Act. The training shall:
  1. a.
    give the participants an understanding of what a thoroughly sound working environment entails in their workplace, the employer and employees' roles and responsibilities, and the roles and duties of the working environment committee, the safety representative, the occupational health service, and the Labour Inspection Authority;
  2. b.
    disseminate knowledge to the participants about the continuous health, environmental and safety work based on broad participation, good documentation and systematic work;
  3. c.
    disseminate knowledge to the participants so that they can carry out a simple risk assessment of physical, psychosocial and organisational factors in the working environment;
  4. d.
    enable the participants to identify factors that promote or hinder a good psychosocial and organisational working environment in their undertaking;
  5. e.
    enable the participants capable to identify the most important physical working environment factors in their own workplace so that injuries and accidents can be prevented, including factors relating to ergonomics, noise and the indoor climate;
  6. f.
    give an introduction to and information about the Working Environment Act and other relevant laws and regulations.
If chemical substances or biological materials are used as mentioned in Section 4-5 of the Working Environment Act, training shall be provided on the health hazards that the substances entail.
Further training shall be provided in topics mentioned in the first and second paragraphs that have a particular impact on the working environment in the undertaking in question, insofar as the safety representatives and members of the working environment committee must be able to perform their duties properly.
Special training should also be provided for safety representatives in safety areas where there are particularly complex working environment problems. The senior safety representative shall have at least the same training as the other safety representatives in the undertaking, in addition to the requisite training for performing his or her duties pursuant to Section 3-5 of these regulations.