Construction industry

There have been significant reductions in the number and rate of injury over the last 20 years or more. Nevertheless, construction remains a high risk industry. Although it accounts for only about 5% of the employees in Britain it still accounts for 22% of fatal injuries to employees and 10% of reported major injuries.

The latest results in construction show:

• 49 fatal injuries to workers. 23 of these fatalities were to the self-employed. This compares with an average of 59 over the previous five years – including an average of 19 to the self-employed (RIDDOR)
• over 5 000 occupational cancer cases are estimated to arise each year as a result of past exposures in the construction sector (Research report 931 "The burden of occupational cancer in Great Britain")
• there were an estimated 74 000 total cases and 31 000 new cases of work-related ill health (LFS)
• an estimated 1.7 million working days were lost due to work-related ill health and a further 0.6 million due to workplace injuries. This equates to 0.87 and 0.34 days per worker (LFS)

Twenty year trends in worker fatalities