Last updated: 27 October 2026
TL;DR: A young person is anyone under 18 and a child is anyone below the minimum school leaving age. Employers must make sure young workers are not exposed to risk because of lack of experience, being unaware of risks, or lack of maturity. The assessment belongs before the first shift, not after it.
A seventeen year old starts on Saturdays in the kennels. She is keen, she is quick, and by week three she is restraining for radiographs because she offered and nobody said no. No assessment was done before she started, and nobody has told her which door she must not go through when the red light is on.
HSE defines the terms precisely: a young person is anyone under 18 and a child is anyone who has not yet reached the official minimum school leaving age.
So young workers split into two groups with different rules, and the boundary is the school leaving age rather than a birthday. Your Saturday kennel assistant at 17 is a young person; a fifteen year old on work experience is a child.
Veterinary practices have more young workers than most small businesses, because weekend kennel work, work experience placements and student veterinary nurses all start early.
The assessment comes first. HSE guidance is that employers should assess any additional factors when employing a young person, such as a health condition which may be affected by the work or the work environment, and review the assessment before a young person starts.
That means looking at the work they will be doing or observing, the risks involved and how those risks are managed, and confirming that instruction, training and supervisory arrangements have been properly thought through.
It is not a separate document for each of your young workers. One assessment covering the weekend kennel role, and one covering a work experience week, will serve for years with a short review for anything individual.
HSE sets them out plainly. Employers must ensure that young workers are not exposed to risk because of lack of experience, being unaware of existing or potential risks, or lack of maturity.
Read those against the seventeen year old restraining for radiographs. She had no experience of that task, no awareness that the room she was standing in was a controlled area, and the maturity of someone who wanted to be useful and said yes.
None of that is her failing. All three are things the assessment exists to anticipate, which is why it belongs before the first shift.
HSE specifically mentions exposure to radiation, noise and vibration, toxic substances and extreme temperatures, and requires that legal limits are met. In a veterinary building that translates into a short, concrete list.
Our guides to radiation protection, manual handling and COSHH assessments cover each of those, and the young worker assessment should simply say which of them a young person may and may not be near.
Tell the rest of the team as well. Most of the risk to young workers comes from a well meaning colleague handing them a task, so the people on shift need to know the rules as clearly as the young person does.
Put the same lines in the work experience letter you send to parents and the school. It sets expectations before anyone arrives and it saves an awkward conversation on the Monday morning about what the week will and will not involve.
Tighter rules again. HSE states that children below the minimum school leaving age must not be employed in industrial workplaces such as factories and construction sites, except on work experience, and that children under 13 are generally prohibited from any form of employment.
Local authorities can set further restrictions on the type of work and the hours for children between 13 and the school leaving age, and those vary, so check with yours rather than assuming.
For a work experience week, treat the student as your responsibility in the same way as staff. Our note on work experience in a veterinary practice covers the arrangement with the school.
Think about the emotional side too. A sixteen year old on their first weekend may meet their first euthanasia, their first road traffic case and their first distressed owner within a month, and nobody thinks to warn them because the rest of the team stopped noticing years ago.
HSE expects clear and sufficient instruction, training and supervision for young workers, and notes that young workers may need more supervision than adults.
More supervision has a rota cost, so plan it. Name who is responsible on each shift rather than leaving it to whoever is nearest, and make sure that person knows they hold it.
Say out loud what the young person must not do without asking, and make it a short list they can remember. Two or three absolute rules beat a folder, and they work because a sixteen year old will follow a clear instruction far more reliably than a policy.
Where a student veterinary nurse is involved, the supervision standard is set separately by RCVS. Our guide to Schedule 3 delegation covers the direct, continuous and personal requirement.
Check the insurance position once, at the start. Some employers’ liability policies carry conditions about the age of staff or about work experience placements, and finding that out after an incident is the wrong order.
Working time rules are more protective for young workers than for adults, with tighter limits on daily and weekly hours, restrictions around night work, and longer rest breaks and daily rest periods.
The practical consequence for a practice is simple. Out of hours shifts, night work and long Saturdays that drift past their planned finish are the areas to check before you build the rota rather than after.
Our notes on working time rules and night workers cover the adult position, and a young person’s limits sit inside those. Book a free 30-minute HR health check if you have a young person starting and want the assessment checked.
HSE defines a young person as anyone under 18, and a child as anyone who has not yet reached the official minimum school leaving age. The two groups have different rules, and the dividing line is the school leaving age rather than a birthday.
You need to have assessed the additional factors before they start, taking account of inexperience, unawareness of risk and lack of maturity. One assessment per role works fine, with a short individual review for anything specific such as a health condition.
Radiation is one of the exposures HSE specifically names, and legal limits must be met. The simplest and safest position for a practice is an absolute rule that young workers do not enter the controlled area, stated clearly on day one.
They are a child rather than a young person, and tighter restrictions apply. Local authorities can also set rules on work type and hours for children between 13 and the school leaving age, so check locally before agreeing a placement.
HSE says they may need more supervision than adults, and expects clear and sufficient instruction and training. Name the responsible person on each shift, because supervision that belongs to everybody belongs to nobody on a busy Saturday.
The seventeen year old restraining for radiographs was not being reckless. She was being helpful in a building where nobody had told her the one thing she needed to know, because the assessment happened after she started rather than before.
Assess young workers once per role, give two or three absolute rules on day one, and name who is supervising. We write these assessments and induction packs for independent practices through HR consultancy for veterinary practices and the new starter checklist.
The Vet HR Team provides HR consultancy and white-labelled staff systems exclusively to UK veterinary practices.
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