Young worker risk assessment: what employers must check before under-18s start

Know who the young-person duties cover

For these health and safety duties, a young person is anyone under 18. A child is someone who has not yet reached the official minimum school leaving age. The employer's general duty to protect employees applies at every age, but the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations add specific considerations for young people.

The employer must protect young people from risks arising from lack of experience, lack of awareness of existing or potential risks, or incomplete maturity. An apprentice aged 18 or over is not a young person under these provisions, although being new or inexperienced still matters when deciding competence, training and supervision. Work-experience students are treated as employees for health and safety purposes while on placement.

Employment restrictions also apply outside the risk-assessment rules. Children below school leaving age cannot generally work in industrial workplaces such as factories or construction sites except on work experience, and separate rules govern children's employment and young workers' hours. A risk assessment cannot authorise work that another law prohibits.

HSE: the law for young people at work ↗ · GOV.UK: employing children ↗

Review the assessment before work starts

An employer must make or review its suitable and sufficient assessment before employing a young person. That does not mean every placement needs a separate document. HSE says an existing assessment can be enough where it already addresses young-person factors and the new starter has a similar level of maturity, understanding and needs to those previously considered.

Review it when employing a young person for the first time, when the work or workplace differs, or where the individual has particular needs. Consider inexperience and immaturity; the workplace and workstation layout; exposure to physical, biological and chemical agents; equipment and how it is handled; work organisation; and the training that will be provided. Ask about relevant physical or psychological capability without making assumptions from age alone.

Employers with five or more employees must record the significant findings and groups especially at risk. A business with fewer than five still has to assess and control the risks even though the general assessment need not be written. In practice, a short recorded young-worker review gives supervisors a reliable brief and evidence of the decisions made.

Management Regulations: risk assessment ↗ · HSE: risks to young people at work ↗

Decide which tasks are suitable—and under what conditions

Assess the real task, not the job title. In a Teesside motor workshop, for example, ‘apprentice technician’ could involve vehicle movement, lifting equipment, compressed springs, battery systems, solvents, noise and powered tools. Each activity needs an answer: allowed independently, allowed only after training with direct supervision, observation only, or prohibited.

Regulation 19 identifies work beyond the young person's physical or psychological capacity; harmful exposure to specified hazardous agents or radiation; accident risks they may not recognise or avoid; and harmful exposure to extreme temperature, noise or vibration. These points should lead to task-specific decisions about equipment, substances, manual handling, work at height, vehicles, lone work and emergency arrangements.

The rule is not a blanket ban on meaningful training. A young person who is no longer a child may undertake work otherwise restricted by regulation 19 where it is necessary for training, they are supervised by a competent person and the risk is reduced to the lowest level reasonably practicable. Other legal prohibitions and age limits still apply. ‘They need to learn sometime’ is not a control measure; the training purpose, safeguards and supervisor must be clear before the task begins.

Management Regulations: protection of young persons ↗ · Related guide: PUWER inspection requirements → · Related guide: work at height assessment →

Make induction and supervision task-specific

Give clear, proportionate instruction on the hazards, controls and boundaries of the tasks the young person will actually perform. Show the method, then ask them to explain or demonstrate it back. Cover how to stop the job, isolate equipment where relevant, report a defect, summon help and raise a concern without feeling they have failed.

Name the competent supervisor and define what supervision means. Direct supervision may be necessary while a task is learned; periodic checks may be appropriate later when capability has been demonstrated. Do not reduce oversight merely because the young worker is confident or eager to please. Check how the work is performed under normal production pressure, not only during the induction demonstration.

Account for communication, literacy, learning needs and any health condition or disability that affects the task. PPE must fit the person and the hazard; adult sizes that slip, obscure vision or restrict movement are not suitable. Make sure other workers know the young person's task limits so an informal request from a colleague does not bypass the plan.

HSE: training and supervision for young people ↗

Coordinate work experience and apprenticeships properly

The employer hosting a work-experience student has the main responsibility for health and safety. Discuss the placement with the organiser and consider information from parents or carers about physical or psychological capacity and particular needs. For a child, the employer must provide a parent with comprehensible information about significant risks and the measures that control them; this is often passed through the school or college.

For apprentices, the employer remains responsible for managing significant workplace risks. A training provider should take reasonable steps to satisfy itself that this is happening, but its visit or paperwork does not replace the employer's assessment, induction or supervision. Where an apprenticeship training agency is the employer, the agency and host organisation need to cooperate so responsibilities and controls do not fall between them.

Keep the exchange proportionate. A low-risk office placement may need a straightforward briefing using existing controls. A placement involving machinery, vehicles, hazardous substances or construction work needs closer discussion about tasks, competence and supervision. Sending a large generic risk-assessment pack is not the same as agreeing what the young person will do safely.

HSE: work experience ↗ · HSE: apprentices ↗ · Management Regulations: information for employees and parents ↗

Young worker start-date checklist

The assessment should develop with the young worker. Review supervision as competence grows, but increase it again when tasks, equipment or conditions change. Check working-time and rest entitlements separately; this safety assessment does not replace employment-law compliance. Guidance and current duties checked on 18 September 2026.

• Confirm the person's age, placement status, tasks and normal working locations.
• Review existing assessments against the specific young-person factors before they start.
• Check physical and psychological capability and any disclosed individual needs.
• Classify each task as independent, supervised, observation-only or prohibited.
• Check equipment and substance restrictions, exposure controls and suitable PPE sizes.
• Appoint a competent supervisor and define the level and frequency of oversight.
• Deliver task-specific induction and verify understanding by explanation or demonstration.
• Explain emergency arrangements, task boundaries and how to stop or raise concerns.
• For a child, provide the parent or carer with the required risk and control information.
• Review after task changes, concerns, errors, near misses or evidence of developing competence.