Q: Does an employer have to provide employees with some form of transport from the workplace to home when such public transport is not available, late at night for instance?
Oct 23 2007
Answered by: Peter Done Ask a question
There is no requirement in the law in the sense of a specific statue that says you must provide transport for employees. However, if you know that where you are placed is potentially unsafe for staff late at night and they may be subjected to unpleasant and unsafe interference you would have to consider whether, under the employer’s duty of care towards the employees, you should take some action in this regard.
It would seem to me that the obvious thing to do is to talk to the people who will be in this situation and see what steps can be taken to ensure that they travel home safely. It may well be that you can arrange for one person who has transport to give lifts to others; it may be that you can rearrange the hours that people work, such that they don’t travel home during unsafe periods.
Perhaps if there are exceptional circumstances, where someone has worked particularly late, for some special reason then you might consider either providing transport yourself or paying for a taxi.
It is an issue where it would be prudent to carry out a risk assessment as well as considering the practicalities of the problem.
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