So many occupational hazards in the Workplace

Occupational hazards

The UK has a low number of work-related fatalities in comparison to other countries, but it’s no cause for celebration. In the year after 31st of March 2021, 142 people in Great Britain lost their lives in a work-related accident. Each one of those deaths was an avoidable tragedy caused by a failure in health and safety management systems, which left family and friends having to come to terms with a significant loss. What the figures recently published by the Health and Safety Executive actually show us is that we need to do more to protect people at work and to protect others impacted by work activities to prevent work-related fatal accidents.

The number of fatalities has stayed very similar for quite a few years now, but it’s far higher than it should be.

So, everyone at every level of every business needs to ask themselves if they are doing everything, they can to protect people and prevent harm. Workplace fatalities are only ever the tip of the iceberg of health and safety failures. The figures published by the HSE for 2021 are COVID fatalities only, but we can safely assume there were many more people injured at work-related accidents with many of those injuries serious and life changing as well as many, many more near misses. In addition, they don’t show us how many people may have been exposed to something at work, which immediately impacted on their physical or mental health or may do so in the future. The HSE figures also say that 60 members of the public were killed in 2020/21 in a work-related accident.

That’s why the HSE has called on business leaders, employers, and self-employed people to review how they manage and organize health and safety to ensure their systems are robust and that they can be followed with the principles of a good risk management system.

Look at your risk assessment process and going through the stages, it must consider all risk groups, including employees, members of the public contractors and others. The key to having a good occupational health and safety management is vital. Just because your business is in a low-risk sector doesn’t mean you don’t need to do anything to manage risk.

These figures are a reminder that we all need good health and safety management practices so we can ensure that people can return home at the end of each working day, safe and well.

If you need any support please contact us today on 07770 302504 or email joanne@chestnutassociates.co.uk