HSE has published online an 11-page revamped Five Steps to Risk Assessment to simplify the activity. The guidance first appeared in 1993, the revision and simplification should 'make it even easier for normal business people, not just health and safety experts, to use'.
The revamp places greater emphasis on making sure that decisions are actually put into practice, examples of what a risk assessment might look like are given, emphasising that risk assessment need not be difficult and the paperwork need not be long and complicated.
Copies of Five Steps to Risk Assessment, INDG163(rev2), are also available from HSE Books.

Comment:
"We want to save lives, not tie businesses up in red tape - good risk assessment is the way to achieve this. Risk assessment is at the heart of sensible health and safety. We believe it should be a practical way of protecting people from real harm and suffering, not a bureaucratic back-covering exercise. On its own paperwork never saved a life, it needs to be a means to an end, resulting in actions that protect people in practice.
I hope that this new, more straightforward guidance will help managers understand what's expected of them and get more focus on the kind of risks that cause real harm and suffering - the ones that killed 220 workers last year and resulted in 35 million working days being lost. This guide takes the user through the process step-by-step with the minimum of fuss to achieve this aim." - HSE's Deputy Chief Executive.