The Health & Safety Executive today released new figures released that reveal the number of people killed at work in Britain fell last year (2009/2010) to a record low.
The provisional data shows that 151 workers were killed between 1 April 2009 and 31 March 2010 compared to 178 deaths in the previous year. However, despite the noticeable improvement the agricultural industry recorded a substantial growth in deaths. 38 workers died in the agricultural industry in the last year, making a return to the levels of previous years after a record low of 25 deaths was recorded in 2008/2009.
Large falls have been recorded in some of the other historically most dangerous industries in Britain:
- 41 fatal injuries to construction workers were recorded - a rate of 2.0 deaths per 100,000 workers, compared to an average of 66 deaths in the past five years and a fall from the 52 deaths (and rate of 2.4) recorded in 2008/09.
- 42 fatal injuries to services workers were recorded, a rate of 0.2 deaths per 100,000, compared to an average of 72 deaths in the past five years and a fall from the 62 deaths (and rate of 0.3) recorded in 2008/09.
- 24 fatal injuries to manufacturing workers were recorded, a rate of 0.9 deaths per 100,000, compared to an average of 38 deaths in the past five years and a fall from 33 deaths (and rate of 1.1) in 2008/09.
As with all Health & Safety statistics, the announcement today shows both encouraging news, as well as reminding us that there is still a long road left to travel to help make workplaces safe.
Improvements to Health & Safety can be achieved in every sector with the right leadership and focusing attention towards more important risks.
The new figures show that compared with the latest data available for the four other leading industrial nations in Europe - Germany, France, Spain and Italy - Great Britain has, for more than the last six years, had the lowest rate of fatal injuries.