This recent report from the Safety & Health Practitioner makes for grim reading: in the last year in the UK, 5000 people suffered injuries as a result of a workplace fall from height, and 40 people died.
According to the report, the information we have is not really sufficient to understand what went wrong – merely reporting on the type of accident, not what caused it in the first place. More transparency is crucial if we’re going to start making progress on this ongoing, serious problem.
There is also speculation that these figures aren’t fully accurate, with self-employed people in particular suspected of under-reporting falls from height, even though they are legally obligated to report any incident.
So mandatory training has not helped the UK’s falls from height statistics in recent years. Why? Well, we’ll echo what we suggested in a previous article…
Time Constraints
Last year we wrote about the pressure that some people who work at height are under – chimney sweeps in particular. People paid per job, rather than by the hour, may be under more pressure to rush, whereas people who are given the freedom to take their time might start to relax a bit too much – we previously said that distraction and underestimation are the two main problems, which leads on to…
Underestimation
The problem could be that the real risk is not taken seriously – many people think that they will “only” sprain a wrist or maybe risk a mild concussion if they fall from a height. It’s common to underestimate how significant a fall from a height of even 3 feet can be, with impact on the body increasing with the increase in height fallen from. This underestimation of the risk can lead to a lack of caution and then simple carelessness.
We have just written an article about the good news that has recently come out of Canada – in Ontario, injuries related to falls from height are down 19%, despite mandatory training having only been implemented in the last decade and, as far as we can tell, Canada’s training is no different to ours. Considering the progress that Canada has made, this doesn’t look good for the UK, and with the consideration of the work at height regulations being scrapped, the picture is looking worse and worse.
Our sole recommendation is that you take work at height safety training even more seriously than the law tells you to – invest in it and treat your safety training as an absolute priority.
Get In Touch
For the best safety equipment for work at height, look no further than Ability International. Whether you need a scaffold tower, a chimney access system or a Desksurfer, we have the solution for you. Click here to browse what we have to offer, and then give us a call to discuss purchase or hire options. You can also fill out our enquiry form with the details of the job and a member of our team will be able to recommend the best product fit for you.
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