FALL IN NUMBER OF WORKPLACE DEATHS BUT NO MARKED IMPROVEMENT IN FATAL INJURY RATE
The total number of workers killed in work-related accidents in Great Britain has fallen to 123, a decrease of 22 fatalities on the previous year, but the fatal injury rate ‘remains broadly in line with pre-pandemic levels’, according to the Health and Safety Executive’s (HSE) provisional figures for 2021/2022.
Great Britain’s OSH regulator’s annual statistics, which were published on Wednesday (6 July), suggest that some progress has been made in two of the four industry sectors responsible for the largest proportion of the nation’s work-related fatalities. However, they also indicate that the two remaining sectors have performed worst since 2020/2021.
The latest statistics, which covers from April 2021 to March 2022, reveal that the profile of fatal injuries by industry sector is broadly similar to that for the five-year period starting in 2017/2018, with construction; agriculture, forestry and fishing; manufacturing; and transportation and storage accounting for 73% of fatal injuries.
The construction sector, which is responsible for around 25% of the total number of fatal injuries to workers in 2021/2022, reported 30 fatalities, a decrease in 10 deaths on the previous reporting year. The HSE notes that the five-year average for this sector is 36 fatalities.
Agriculture, forestry and fishing, which accounts for 18% of the total number of fatalities, also reported an improvement, with 22 fatal injuries, a decrease from 34 in 2020/2021. The sector’s five-year average is 28 fatalities.
However, manufacturing’s number of fatalities rose from 19 deaths in 2020/2021 to 22 deaths, which was also an increase of three on the sector’s five-year average.
The transportation and storage sector’s total number of fatal injuries rose slightly more than that seen in manufacturing. In 2021/2022, there were 16 fatalities, an increase of five on the previous year. The sector’s five-year average is 14 fatalities.
However, the fatal injury rate, which considers changes in the numbers of people in employment between years, has been broadly flat in recent years and the latest figures show they are in line with pre-pandemic levels. Even so, some sectors have shown noticeable trends.