Clarification of Employer Duty To Provide Personal Protective Equipment and Train Each Employee

In this rulemaking, OSHA is amending its standards to add language clarifying that the personal protective equipment (PPE) and training requirements impose a compliance duty to each and every employee covered by the standards and that noncompliance may expose the employer to liability on a per-employee basis. The amendments consist of new paragraphs added to the introductory sections of the listed Parts and changes to the language of some existing respirator and training requirements. This action, which is in accord with OSHA's longstanding position, is being taken in response to recent decisions of the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission indicating that differences in wording among the various PPE and training provisions in OSHA safety and health standards affect the Agency's ability to treat an employer's failure to provide PPE or training to each covered employee as a separate violation. The amendments add no new compliance obligations. Employers are not required to provide any new type of PPE or training, to provide PPE or training to any employee not already covered by the existing requirements, or to provide PPE or training in a different manner than that already required. The amendments simply clarify that the standards apply to each employee.