These Regulations amend the Employer’s Liability (Compulsory Insurance) Regulations (Northern Ireland) 1999 (“the 1999 Regulations”). The 1999 Regulations specify employers who are exempted from the requirements of Part III of the Employer’s Liability (Defective Equipment and Compulsory Insurance) (Northern Ireland) Order 1972 (“the 1972 Order”) to insure and maintain insurance against liability for personal injury suffered by their employees and arising out of and in the course of their employment. The specified employers are certain public bodies; the specified classes of employer include any employer to the extent that he is required to insure under a compulsory motor insurance scheme by virtue of the fact that his employees are carried on, or are alighting from or are entering into, a motor vehicle. The exemptions specified in the 1999 Regulations are additional to those contained in Article 7 of the 1972 Order.
These Regulations add to the exemptions specified in Schedule 2 to the 1999 Regulations –
any employer which is a company that has only one employee and that employee also owns fifty per cent or more of the issued share capital in that company; and
the Northern Ireland Legal Services Commission.
These regulations reduce costs on businesses; an assessment of this impact has been made. In Great Britain the corresponding Regulations are the Employers' Liability (Compulsory Insurance) (Amendment) Regulations 2004 (S.I. 2004/2882). The Great Britain Health and Safety Executive has prepared a regulatory impact assessment in relation to those Regulations. A copy of that assessment together with a Northern Ireland supplement prepared by the Health and Safety Executive for Northern Ireland is held at the offices of that Executive at 83 Ladas Drive, Belfast, BT6 9FR from where a copy may be obtained on request.