Falling up not down
Interestingly the amount of work related accidents have gone up while the number of Health and Safety Executive inspectors has periodically gone down. The current figures draw attention to the 12,000 workers that have been injured as well as the 32 employees that were tragically killed. In addition, some 3.3 million working days were lost because of illness directly caused by the work people did, or exacerbated by their presence in the work place.
The HSE chairwoman Judith Hackitt, commented on the figures expressing her concern in regards to “slips and trips which can have an enormous impact on people’s lives” which “are still not reducing”. She felt a renewed commitment from all those that have been involved in the effort to reduce the number of work accidents was needed. She also felt that “in the difficult and uncertain months ahead” it was vital that employers and supervisors do not “take their eyes off the ball”.
Updated on 10/29/2008