Work-related injuries and ill health in education - Days lost

Data from the 2008/09 LFS and SWI surveys indicate that the combined estimate of the number of days lost (full-day equivalent) due to workplace injury and work-related ill health attributed to the current or most recent job in the education sector was 2.2 million, equating to an average annual loss of an estimated 1.1 days per worker. This was of a similar order (not statistically significantly different) to the rate for all industries (1.1 days per worker) and to the corresponding rates in 2007/08 (1.6 days per worker), 2006/07 (1.4 days per worker), 2005/06 (1.0 days per worker), 2004/05 (0.89 days per worker) and 2003/04 (1.2 days per worker).

Workplace injuries and work-related illness accounted for an estimated 0.2 and 2.0 million working days lost (full-day equivalent) respectively in 2008/09, with corresponding rates of 0.10 and 0.98 days per worker.

The injury rate was statistically significantly lower than the corresponding all industry rate of 0.18 days per worker and similar (not statistically significantly different) to the respective rates of 0.19, 0.14, 0.078, 0.11 and 0.12 days per worker in 2007/08, 2006/07, 2005/06, 2004/05 and 2003/04.

However, the ill health rate was of a similar order (not statistically significantly different) to the all industry rate of 0.94 days per worker and respective rates of 1.4, 1.2, 0.95, 0.78 and 1.1 days per worker in 2007/08, 2006/07, 2005/06, 2004/05 and 2003/04. (See Table WDLIND).

The estimated average annual rate of certified absence from work-related ill health or injury in education from THOR-GP (2006-2008) was 0.30 certified days lost per employee. This is an increase from the three year average for 2005-2007 of 0.22, brought about by a large increase for the year 2008, where the average rose to 0.42days lost per employee, almost double the rate for all industries (see Table THORGP07).