Reminder for employers after 20 workers killed in Scotland

Date:

27 December 2012

(Statistics available for local authority areas - see Notes to editors)

Employers are being urged to focus on real risk after 20 workers lost their lives while at work in Scotland last year - an increase of six on the previous year.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has asked business to rethink workplace safety provisions in the New Year after the number of deaths in Great Britain as a whole failed to show a significant fall in 2011/12.

A total of 173 workers were killed at work in Great Britain last year, compared to 175 worker deaths during 2010/11. More than 23,000 workers also suffered a major injury.

The 20 deaths and 2,240 major injuries in Scotland last year compare to 14 deaths and 2,660 major injuries in 2010/11. Another7,447 Scotland workers suffered injuries which required at least three days off work in 2011/12, compared to 7,667 in 2010/11.

The latest provisional figures show that nationwide, on average, six in every million workers were killed while at work between April 2011 and March 2012.

High-risk industries include construction, which had 49 deaths last year, agriculture with 33 deaths, manufacturing with 31 deaths and waste and recycling with 5 deaths - making up more than half of all workplace deaths in Great Britain during 2011/12.

Urging employers to make the safety of workers their top priority for 2013, David Snowball, HSE Director for Scotland & Northern England, said:

"Each year, instead of enjoying the occasion, families of workers in Scotland who failed to come home from work spend Christmas and the New Year thinking of the loved ones who are not there to enjoy it with them.

"Hundreds of other workers who have had their lives changed by major injury will be experiencing difficulties of their own.

"Health and safety in the workplace needs to be taken seriously. I hope that in 2013 employers will tackle the real rather than the trivial dangers that workers face and not mire themselves in pointless paperwork so we can reduce the number of workplace deaths and major injury."

Information on tackling health and safety dangers in workplaces is available on HSE's website at www.hse.gov.uk

Notes to editors

1. The Health and Safety Executive is Britain's national regulator for workplace health and safety. It aims to reduce work-related death, injury and ill health. It does so through research, information and advice; promoting training; new or revised regulations and codes of practice; and working with local authority partners by inspection, investigation and enforcement. www.hse.gov.uk
2. The following table lists the numbers of deaths and injuries across Scotland during 2011/12 and 2010/11. Three-day injuries are injuries where workers had to take three or more days off work to recover.

   	Fatal injuries		Major injuries		Over 3 day injuries
   	10/11	11/12	10/11	11/12	10/11	11/12
   Scotland	14	20	2 660	2 240	7 667	7 447
   Aberdeen	-	-	203	151	517	367
   Aberdeenshire	4	-	108	101	289	349
   Angus	1	-	42	44	109	114
   Argyll & Bute	1	1	48	49	130	125
   Clackmannanshire	-	-	23	17	50	52
   Comhairle Nan Eilean Siar	-	-	12	8	27	32
   Dumfries & Galloway	2	-	99	77	234	236
   Dundee	-	2	80	52	262	242
   East Ayrshire	1	2	58	56	152	162
   East Dunbartonshire	-	-	20	23	62	57
   East Lothian	-	-	29	28	92	81
   East Renfrewshire	-	-	20	13	56	50
   Edinburgh	-	-	218	187	762	721
   Falkirk	-	1	71	68	324	315
   Fife	1	2	196	119	457	418
   Glasgow	-	1	362	335	1 150	1 138
   Highland	1	3	100	94	222	245
   Inverclyde	-	-	32	42	106	95
   Midlothian	-	-	33	21	98	79
   Moray	-	-	56	47	109	132
   North Ayrshire	-	-	52	35	128	157
   North Lanarkshire	-	-	156	133	480	446
   Orkney Islands	1	1	12	10	26	34
   Perth & Kinross	1	-	90	75	195	173
   Renfrewshire	-	1	99	88	252	259
   Scottish Borders	1	1	48	46	146	153
   Shetland Islands	-	-	11	8	40	44
   South Ayrshire	-	1	60	50	173	180
   South Lanarkshire	-	1	128	99	397	388
   Stirling	-	2	64	39	183	160
   West Dunbartonshire	-	-	39	27	97	108
   West Lothian	-	1	91	98	342	335

3. A list of the deaths reported to HSE during 2011/12 is available at http://www.hse.gov.uk/foi/fatalities/2011-12.htm The information is updated on a monthly basis, and does not purport to be a formal statistical release. Subsequent investigation may determine that some are not reportable as workplace deaths, for example deaths due to natural causes.
4. Further information on workplace statistics can be found at www.hse.gov.uk/statistics
5. Based on available data (2007), Britain has the lowest rate of fatal injuries to workers among the five leading industrial nations in Europe - Great Britain, Germany, France, Spain and Italy.
6. The reporting of health and safety incidents at work is a statutory requirement, set out under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 1995 (RIDDOR). A reportable incident includes: a death or major injury; any accident which does not result in major injury, but the injured person still has to take three or more days off their normal work to recover; a work related disease; a member of the public being injured as a result of work related activity and taken to hospital for treatment; or a dangerous occurrence, which does not result in a serious injury, but could have done.
7. The figures for 2011/12 are provisional. They will be finalised in June 2013 following any necessary adjustments arising from investigations, in which new facts can emerge about whether the accident was work-related. The delay of a year in finalising the figures allows for such matters to be fully resolved in the light of formal interviews with all relevant witnesses, forensic investigation and coroners' rulings.

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