To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what recent assessment he has made of the impact of managing the risk of covid-19 in the workplace on duty holders’ safety cases in the offshore oil and gas industry.

All installations currently operating on the UKCS have a safety case that has been accepted by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). Safety cases are required to demonstrate how a duty holder operating an installation complies with the relevant statutory provisions in relation to the hazards created by their work activities. HSE’s ongoing offshore intervention plan tests the validity of demonstrations made in those offshore safety cases by identifying failures in compliance and requiring any non-compliance to be addressed. The planned interventions also check on how effectively duty holders are managing the potential safety impact of their responses to COVID19.