Health & Safety statistics show a move in the right direction

Across the East Midlands fewer people are being seriously injured at work according to figures released by the Health & Safety Executive for 2009/10. There were 2,056 major workplace injuries in the region compared to 2,150 in 2008/9.

However, the news isn’t all good, with the number of deaths rising by one to 12, while the estimated number of people who believed they were suffering from work-related illnesses rose from 86,000 in 2008/09 to 101,000.

Across the region, more than 2.2 million working days were lost due to illness or injury, an average of 1.29 days lost per worker.

The Health & Safety Executive continues to take a tough line with firms in the East Midlands who put workers at risk by breaking safety legislation. It brought 114 offences to court in 2009/10, 79 of which led to a successful conviction Nationwide Figures across England, Scotland and Wales also show movement in the right direction, this year 28.5 million working days (equivalent to 1.2 days per worker) were lost to injury and ill health – compared with 29.3 million in 2008/09.

Nationally, workplace fatal injuries fell from 179 in 2008/09 to a record low of 152 in 2009/10, and there was a reduction of more than 11,000 in the number of workplace injuries classified as major injuries or incurring more than three days absence from work.

Comparison with international data still shows Britain to be one of the safest places to work in the European Union.

Judith Hackitt, Chair of HSE said:

“It is encouraging to see further reduction in the number of people being killed and seriously injured at work. We now need to ensure that the improvements which are being made continue. Every statistic represents an individual or a family which is now suffering as a result of health and safety failings at work.

“Britain remains one of the safest places to work in the EU and we are rightly proud of this record. The challenge now is to focus on those areas where improvement is slow to emerge.

“We know what good practice looks like but there remain significant areas of poor practice which still result in serious harm to people at work. These statistics also remind us yet again of the significant gains which are yet to be made in reducing the harm caused to people’s health by work.”

Major injuries at work have fallen since 2000 and this trend continues with 27,096 workers reported as being injured in 2009/10 (91.0 per 100,000) compared with 29,000 in 2008/09 (95.2 per 100,000).

The number of people estimated to be suffering from work-related ill health in 2009/10 was 1.3 million. Almost 1.2 million fewer working days were lost to ill health – a total of 23.4 million.