Employers urged to prioritise safety after West Midlands work deaths

EMPLOYERS are being urged to focus on risk after seven workers lost their lives while at work in the West Midlands last year and 957 suffered a major injury.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is encouraging businesses 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 seven deaths and 957 major injuries in the West Midlands last year compare to four deaths and 1,093 major injuries in 2010/11. Another 4,261 workers suffered injuries which required at least three days off work in 2011/12, compared to 4,360 in 2010/11.

High-risk industries include construction, agriculture, manufacturing and waste and recycling.

Urging employers to make the safety of workers their top priority for 2013, Rosi Edwards, HSE’s regional director for the Midlands, said: “Each year, instead of enjoying the occasion, families of workers in West Midlands who failed to come home from work safely, spend Christmas and the New Year thinking of absent loved ones.

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

“When put into this kind of context, it is clear why health and safety in British workplaces needs to be taken seriously. I urge employers to tackle the real dangers that workers face rather than focusing on the trivial or mire themselves in pointless paperwork.

“My New Year wish is that we can reduce the number of deaths and major injury in 2013 and make the year ahead a happier one for many families.”