Stroud District Green Party has called for workplaces to have a certified and published plan for Covid-safety to be in place before employees are required to return to work.

Simon Pickering, chair of Stroud District Council Environment Committee said:"We must ensure that employers, HSE, environmental health departments and trade unions work together to ensure workplace safety and to give employees the confidence to return to work.

"Covid-safety plans should be drawn up by each employer for each of their workplaces.

"These would need to be signed off by local environmental health officers together with trade union health and safety reps where the workplace has a recognised union. Environmental health officers should conduct spot-check monitoring visits to local workplaces to ensure that the plan is being followed.”

Martin Whiteside, Green leader on Stroud District Council, said:“We salute the courage of those who have stayed at their posts despite risk to their own lives and in the knowledge that their places of work could never be made entirely safe.

"These include health workers but also those in the food supply chain, the delivery process, and who provide community services.

"As more people return to work, industrial sectors can learn from the expertise developed in these front-line workplaces.”

Under the provisions of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974, all employers with five or more employees are required to undertake a specific Covid-19 risk assessment before their employees return.