Positive progress for industry safety stats

Bill Callaghan, chairman of the Health & Safety Commission (HSC), has welcomed what he describes as "tentative signs" that the construction industry is beginning to make some real progress towards safer site working.

Latest statistics indicate that a substantial fall in site deaths is at least being maintained. They show that there were 39 construction fatalities in the six months to the end of September 2002. This is the same number as recorded in the same period of the previous year.

Revised provisional figures for the whole year 2001/02 now record a total of 85 fatalities. This is six more than the 79 deaths shown by earlier provisional statistics. But the 12-month total still represents a 19% reduction in the number of fatal injuries compared with the previous year when fatalities totalled 105.

Bill Callaghan's cautious tone was echoed this week by Bob Blackman, TGWU national secretary and a member of the Health & Safety Executive's construction advisory committee (Coniac).

"I very much welcome the fall in site deaths," he said. "But you must remember that this only takes us back to the fatal accident level of 1998/99 before fatalities suddenly soared."

Callaghan's comment is contained in the HSC's first report on progress towards the government's 10-year health and safety targets.

He said: "These are early days in terms of establishing benchmarks and measuring progress against our 10-year targets. However, it is clear from recent figures that the biggest challenges facing us in meeting these targets lie in the field of occupational health. We have seen a big increase in the estimate of working days lost through ill-health."

Referring specifically to construction, he added: "Progress is being made by some stakeholders in the construction industry where tentative signs of an improvement are beginning to show. I hope these will develop into a long-term positive change."

The HSC progress report notes that construction represents a priority programme for health and safety improvements.

It states: "The rate of reported major injuries to employees has declined since 1999/2000. It fell 12% in 2001/02 compared to 2000/01 and the number fell 8% from 4,303 to 3,959. Major injury results are dependent on the level of reporting and hence this may not be a statistically significant change."