Construction industry 'needs to do more'

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has called for the construction industry to do more to provide workers with health and safety guidance.

Findings from a recent, unvalidated survey reveal that 69 workers were killed in 2007-08 so far.

However, despite this marking a possible ten per cent improvement, the HSE has warned the industry not to become complacent with implementing and regulating health and safety systems.

Stephen Williams, HSE principal inspector, said that while it is encouraging to see a drop in the number of deaths, there is still more work to be done by firms.

"It is totally unacceptable that, once again, a significant number of lives have been lost and continue to be put at risk on construction sites," he said.

In a phase of spot-checks from the HSE to assess whether businesses were complying with health and safety regulations, work was stopped on a third of the 1,000 sites visited.

Enforcement notices were served on 395 enforcement notices and in 13 cases inspectors believed the situation on site to be so poor that prosecution is being considered

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