Cap. 646 Art. 2Interpretation.      Cap. 431.    Cap. 411.

In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires:

"Authority" means the Occupational Health and Safety Authority as established by article 4;

"administrative instrument" means such instruments in accordance with article 17 which are required to discharge the Authority’s functions and shall include any order, directive, protocol, guideline, explanatory memorandum, information circular, including notices, or other publication issued by the Authority;

"Board" means the Governing Board regulated in accordance with articles 4, 7 and 8;

"Chief Executive" means the Chief Executive Officer appointed under article 9;

"client" means any natural or legal person for whom a project is carried out;

"Code of Practice" means a standard, specification or any other written or illustrated form of practical guidance, instruction or control;

"competent person" means a person possessing adequatequalifications and minimum accreditations in terms of law or where required, as established by the Authority through administrative instruments, suitable training and sufficient knowledge, experience and skill for the safe performance of the specific task or work required, and who provides advice with regard to the health and safety at work preventive and protective measures required to be taken, and whose name appears in the competent person register administered or otherwise delegated by the Authority in relation to such matters which are regulated by the Authority;

"constituted bodies" means any body which is established to represent the interests of its members such as workers or employers and shall include any body recognised under the Malta Council for Economic and Social Development

Act and other bodies of a similar nature which are recognised under any other law;

"disciplined force" shall have the same meaning as assigned to it in article 47 of the Constitution and shall include the Civil Protection Department established by the Civil

Protection Act;

"duty holder" means any person who has a duty or obligation to fulfill and, or the responsibility to ensure that a duty or an obligation is fulfilled by virtue of any requirement of this Act or of subsidiary legislation, and shall include as the case may be, an employer, a self-employed person, a worker, a client, a project supervisor for health and safety matters, a manager who is responsible for workers, a supervisor who is responsible for workers, an HSRO and any other person to whom this Act or any subsidiary legislation made thereunder assigns a duty or responsibility;

"employer" means any person for whom work or a service is performed by a worker or other person who has an employment relationship with a worker, and includes a contractor or subcontractor who performs work or provides a service or undertakes to perform any work or to supply services, and

(a) in relation to work performed under a contract for services means the contractor or subcontractor, but shall not include the directors, managers, partners or owners, occupiers or possessors on behalf of whom work is being carried out, except as regards any of the tools, materials or equipment provided by them with regard to any defects thereof or therein which are known and not declared or which could have been known;

(b) in respect of all other organisations including voluntary ones or in respect of any other form of employment under a contract of service, includes any of the persons in overall direction or having day-to-day management;

"Executive" means the Health and Safety Executive regulated in accordance with articles 4 and 9;

"financial year" means any period of twelve (12) months st ending on the 31 December as determined from time to time by virtue of administrative instruments:

Provided that the financial year which commences on a date after the 1st January shall be extended for such period so as to terminate on the subsequent 31st December;

"HSRO" means the Health and Safety Reporting Officer appointed in accordance with article 12(8) and who is a high-ranking employee at management level, or such other person which an employer may appoint, as may be established by regulations issued in terms of this Act;

"Minister" means the Minister responsible for health and safety at work;

"officer" means a health and safety at work officer appointed in accordance with article 18 and who is in possession of a certificate of appointment issued according to the provisions of the said article;

"person" includes a body of persons and any body corporate established by or under any law;

"public officer" in relation to article 21 shall have the same meaning assigned to it by article 124 of the Constitution but does not include the Chief Justice, a judge of the Superior Courts or a magistrate of the Inferior Courts;

"self-employed person" means a person who works for profit or gain other than under a contract of employment;

"Tribunal" means the Health and Safety Tribunal as established by article 23;

"work" means any duty, activity, task or service producing a product or result, carried out by a worker or self-employed person and being performed for payment or for free or in exchange for goods, for services, for profit or for benefit;

"worker" means any person employed by an employer to perform work, or who provides a service to another person under a contract of service or for service, whether such contract is in writing or otherwise, and includes a trainee, an apprentice, a volunteer, who were it not for the lack of remuneration, would essentially be undertaking responsibilities akin to those of a paid employee and a self-employed person, but shall not include the crew of a ship or an aircraft registered in Malta or any other person employed thereon as part of the ship or aircraft’s complement;

"workers’ health and safety representative" means a person elected, chosen or designated, as prescribed in regulations, to represent workers on all matters relating to the promotion and protection of their health or safety at work;

"workplace" means any premises, place, facility, vehicle, vessel or seacraft or any other movable or immovable or location, whether public or private, where work is carried out or to which the worker has access in the course of his employment, and without prejudice to the generality of the foregoing, shall include a vehicle or vessel or any other seacraft where such vessel or seacraft is within a port in Malta or the internal or territorial waters thereof, or at any dockyard, harbour or other similar installation in Malta, other than a warship belonging to a foreign state.