CWU calls on employers to work with unions on safety


Dave Joyce, national health and safety officer at the CWU communication workers’ union, has called for employers to invest in health and safety and work with unions and their health and safety reps to improve workplace standards after the HSE released its latest annual injury and ill-health statistics.


The figures show that: 137 workers were killed in 2016-17; 1.3 million workers were suffering from work related ill-health; there were 609,000 workplace injuries; and 12,000 lung disease deaths estimated to be linked to past workplace exposure. 


The HSE says that workplace injury and new cases of ill health cost Britain £14.9 billion a year with 31.2 million working days lost.


Safety campaigners and unions say these official figures underestimate the true extent of work-related death, injury and ill-health. A Hazards Campaign report published earlier this year says that work kills 140 people a day in Britain and estimates the number of people made ill by work is around five times greater than HSE estimates — at least six million.


Joyce said that the latest figures should “act as a spur to employers to work harder to reduce fatalities and the impact of ill-health and injury on the UK’s workforce.”


www.hse.gov.uk/statistics


www.gmhazards.org.uk/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Hazards-Campaign-challenging-the-HSE-statistics.pdf