Concerns have been raised that employees are being forced to work in non-COVID-secure workplaces and that the HSE is not investigating or enforcing adequately.

In the early days of the Coronavirus pandemic, Prime Minister Boris Johnson set out the role of the HSE in ensuring workplace safety, saying:

“We are going to insist that businesses across this country look after their workers and are COVID-secure and COVID-compliant. The Health and Safety Executive will be enforcing that, and we will have spot inspections to make sure that businesses are keeping their employees safe."

However, even back then it was thought that this was placing an unrealistic expectation on the under-resourced enforcement body.

“The reality,” said Mike Clancy, General Secretary of the Prospect union that represents HSE inspectors, is that cuts to its budget since 2010 have led to an organisation that was too small to function in that fashion, even before the pandemic hit.”

The HSE says it has scaled up its work to check and support firms during the pandemic; however, The Observer reports that no companies have been prosecuted and fined for breaking workplace Coronavirus safety rules since the start of the latest national lockdown in England, although a spokeswoman for the HSE said that its inspectors "continue to be out and about, putting employers on the spot and checking that they are complying with health and safety law".

She added that the HSE has introduced telephone spot-checks in response to the crisis, saying "We continue to scale up the number of spot check calls and visits we are doing so we can reach as many businesses as possible during the current lockdown period."

The HSE can enter any premises that inspectors think it necessary to enter for the purposes of enforcing the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and its relevant statutory provisions. HSE inspectors have the power to enter a site or premises, and although the HSE states it should only be at ‘reasonable times’, this can be overlooked if the inspector deems a situation to be immediately dangerous.

TUC general secretary Frances O'Grady said: "If the government is upping enforcement, ministers should start with employers who break COVID-19 safety rules."

She also called for an increase in resources for the HSE "to stop rogue employers getting away with putting staff at risk. Every employer needs to know an inspection could happen any time."

The HSE has carried out more than 32,300 site visits during the pandemic.