The Health and Safety Executive has a campaign running until 2010 to reduce slips, trips and falls by 30 per cent. As well as creating a safe environment by house-keeping and good building design, a focal point of the campaign is workers and their footwear.

Health and Safety legislation includes footwear in the workplace. The basic legislative requirement is that all reasonable efforts must be made to eliminate or reduce the likelihood of injury occurring in the first place. An employer may need to issue safety or protective footwear to reduce the severity of an injury.

Risk assessments are used to decide whether an employee needs special footwear for work.