Assignment 3B

Health and safety policies

Channel 4s health and safety policies are aims to create and sustain a culture where health and safety are taken seriously, this means a safe environment for everyone that’s associated with channel 4. Channel state that they are obligated to maintain their standard of health and safety procedures, commit resources to develop, maintain and communicate health and safety, investigate incidents so that lessons can be learnt, adopt a risk management so channel 4s standards reach further improvements and to provide information, instruction, training and supervision to allow their employees to perform their jobs safely. Channel 4s employees need to be aware of all their health and safety procedures and information, training and supervision related to theirs and their colleague’s work. The health and safety policies would help me and others when working in the TV industry, I know this because the information has been set into specific guideline, which include you having a supervisor and receiving training so that you learn how to follow the health and safety precautions properly and are supervised until you understand what you are doing and know how to do it.

Equal opportunities

My understand of channel 4s equal opportunities is channel 4 created a commitment for equal opportunities where they increased or maintained staff levels in under-represented categories. Recently channel 4 has particularly been working on improving recruitment of those with disabilities. They created a internet database called Four All, which helps programme makers recruit disabled people. Channel 4 does not discriminate based on the grounds of sex, sexual orientation, martial status, race, colour, ethnic origin, disability, age, political or religious beliefs. Channel 4 has been recruiting people who best suit the job and have been monitoring the diversity of employees. Over the coming years there has been an increase in employment of the ethnic minorities and as it stands women continue to form the majority of staff. My source shows that in 2009 the amount of employees that are from ethnic minorities was at 12% and increased to 13% in 2010, which shows that their policies are working. The amount of women working in channel 4 have also increase in the space of a year, in 2009 the percentage of women working for channel 4 was 55% and by 2010 that increased to 57%, which shows the increase of diverse workers in channel 4.

Employment Equality (Age) Regulations 2006

The Employment Equality regulations of 2006 states that its unfair and prohibited to harass, discriminate or victimise employees, trainees or job applicants based on the grounds of their age. I think that this is a useful law for both employees and employers because it gives rules and boundaries that have to be followed by the employer so that he doesn’t discriminate anyone based on age. These regulations give the employees rights so that they have a say if they feel that they are being treated unfairly. This means that employers have to treat all their employees fairly on the basis of their age or they may suffer prosecution.

Employer’s liability

Employer’s liability is a compulsory act that was created in 1969 that requires employers to carry out insurance against any personal injury their employees may suffer from carrying out their job. This protects the employees and employers by a legal agreement that makes the company pay for all employee injuries that happen whilst the employee is under working hours, saving the employees from paying for a huge hospital bill. Channel 4 doesn’t accept any liability based on the fact that their digital products and services come from a third party, which makes them not responsible for anyone outside of the company such as the users/viewers.

Employee rights

Channels 4s employee rights are to receive itemised pay slips, which include details about every pay interval. The right to have time off work, which means they can have holidays, vacations and breaks from work. The rights to health and safety, which means they are insured for any injuries they obtain whilst working. The rights to retirement, which means all employees, are allowed to carry out work until the employee is at least 65 years of age. The rights to equality, which means the employee can’t be discriminated against on the grounds of race, gender, religion, disability, sexual orientation or age whilst being a employee, trainee, or visitor. Employees also have the right to dismissal, which means they aren’t allowed to be fired on unfair claims; this law was created to reduce the amount of unfair dismissal that happened in a working environment.

Trade unions

Trade unions are a group of organisation workers that have banded together to achieve goals like protecting the integrity of trade; this means that trade unions are people that enforce laws about trades to make them fair. This means they try making it so that employees receive higher pay and are receiving better working conditions. An example of a trade union that is related to the television industry is BECTU, which are the UK’s

media and entertainment trade union. BECTU provide a range of services which include negotiation of pay, conditions and contracts with employers, personal advise, representation for individuals, advice about health and safety, benefits and services for members, training, support, courses, events, opportunities, union journal and a website designed to improve access to the unions advice and support. The advantages of being a part of a trade union are the free resources they get such as training and support, which give them the information they need to know what to do when they are or know someone who is being underpaid or are working in poor working conditions, this allows them to be effective and useful in everyday work situations. Trade unions are important because they help ensure that employees get the correct types of payments, work conditions, support and training, which will allow them to perform their job at the best of their abilities.

Intellectual property

Intellectual property is a creative piece of work that can be treat like a physical possession. Intellectual property tends to fall under 4 different categories, which are copyright, trademarks, design rights and patents. Copyright gives author and artists rights that prohibit unauthorised usage of their material, which can be literary, artistic, musical, dramatic, films, sound recordings and typographical arrangements. This law of copyright prevents things such as infringement and plagiarism, which is basically using someone else’s idea (without their consent) to make money. Trademarks are generally names, words, slogans, designs, symbols or other device that differentiate and identifies a company/organisation from others. The consequences of using someone else trademarked item is the same as breaching copyright laws, which is prosecution. Design rights are rights over a specific design created or purchased by you, which mean that other people cant use the design that you own to make money or to gain publicity without authorisation by the owner. Patents are rights over an invention that an individual or group owns, which mean other people aren’t allowed to use this invention without authorisation by the owner. Patents give the exclusive owner the power to use, sell or manufacture an invention. The advantages of copyright are the ability to sue anyone who violates the copyright laws and uses your idea for a profitable venture, which means you will usually earn money from that person’s use of your copyrighted item. Another advantage is the protection of your idea, which disallows people the ability to steal it. The advantages of trademark are the abilities to sell use and manufacture items under that logo without someone else being able to steal your idea and try claim money from your accomplishments. This gives you the ability to take other individuals or groups to court fro using you trademarked item. These protections stop

people from being able to steal your idea and make money from something that you created. An example of copyright is if someone uses artist’s music in a movie without the artists consent. Although the artists music is getting promoted in the movie the music was used unauthorised and made money so the artist has the rights to so that the individual or group that made the movie have to pay him for his music that was made part of their production without his consent. An example of trademark is if someone used Cadburys logo to sell their product to someone without Cadburys consent, it means Cadbury can sue them because the person/group used another organisations logo to make money.

Sources

http://www.channel4.com/media/documents/corporate/foi-docs/h&spolicy.pdf

www.ofcom.org.uk/static/archive/.../ Equal _ Opportunities _APR_Text.com

http://www.channel4.com/info/corporate/corporate-responsibility/people

http://www.compactlaw.co.uk/free-legal-articles/age-discrimination.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Employers'_Liability_(Compulsory_Insurance)_Act_1969

http://career-advice.monster.co.uk/in-the-workplace/workplace-issues/what-are-my-rights-as-an-employee/article.aspx

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_union

https://www.bectu.org.uk/about

http://www.copyrightservice.co.uk/copyright/intellectual_property