The Issue: A worker has been informed that for health and safety reasons all the lights in the open plan office must have working bulbs in them. Due to a pre-existing eye condition, the worker has switched off a strip light above their workstation for the last three years, but this will not now be allowed.
Panel Opinion: The panel has identified numerous reasons why the facilities management team in this workplace may want to have all lights on but none of them has anything to do with real health and safety risks. The worker has valid (medical) reasons for asking that the strip light be removed from above the workstation and simple common sense suggests that the request should be accommodated, rather than falling back on health and safety as an excuse.
