If a company employs its own occupational health and safety specialist and physician, a system must be established to monitor and oversee these professionals. Establishing such a monitoring mechanism requires expertise in its own right. Without such a monitoring system, the company can only identify its shortcomings through an occupational health and safety inspection or after a work accident.

    Joint Health and Safety Units are subject to continuous online or on-site inspections by the General Directorate of Occupational Health and Safety. Companies that do not comply with regulations are given certain penalties, and Joint Health and Safety Units that reach a certain penalty score within five years are closed down, and their founders are prohibited from establishing a new Joint Health and Safety Unit. This naturally makes it mandatory for every Joint Health and Safety Unit that wants to survive to take the work seriously.

    In short, if a business is receiving services from a Joint Health and Safety Unit, it is also receiving services with the internal audit system that is vital to the sustainability of the Joint Health and Safety Unit. However, if the company employs its own occupational health and safety specialist and physician, this monitoring mechanism must be established by the company itself.

    There is also the issue of penalties. If the company receives a penalty for a deficiency that the specialist or physician should have reported to the company but did not, or in case of an accident, who is responsible? Who will pay the penalty?

• If the company is receiving services from a Joint Health and Safety Unit, it can seek recourse for the penalty.
• If the company employs its own specialist-physician, it cannot seek recourse.

    Occupational health and safety is a relatively new topic in our country. For example, the first decree related to occupational health and safety in the UK was published in 1788, and current occupational health and safety laws have been in effect since 1970, whereas as you know, occupational health and safety legislation was only published in our country in 2012. Therefore, the gap between our country and industrialized countries in terms of occupational health and safety has widened both in practice and in culture.

    To close this gap quickly, specialization was deemed necessary, and the concept of Joint Health and Safety Units was introduced into our lives. The most important reason for the existence of Joint Health and Safety Units is actually their duty to transfer occupational health and safety practices and culture to the companies they work with.