Statistics for Fatal Farm Accidents in Ireland Highlighted in Workplace Safety Handbook

by | May 6, 2015

Statistics for fatal farm accidents in Ireland have received a special mention in a recently-released workplace safety handbook – the “Safety Representative Resource Book”.

The National Irish Safety Organisation´s “Safety Representative Resource Book” was launched last week by the Minister for Business and Employment – Ged Nash – at a joint national event to mark Workers Memorial Day Ireland.

In addition to Mr Nash and representatives of the National Irish Safety Organisation, the event to commemorate workers killed, injured or made ill by their working conditions was attended by Patricia King – General Secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions – Martin O´Halloran, CEO of the Health and Safety Authority, and Danny McCoy from the business and employer association IBEC.

The commemorative event had a sober overtone – particularly when representatives were reminded that 253 persons had been killed in work-related accidents between 2010 and 2014, and that many thousands more had been injured or had suffered ill health. In 2014 alone there were 56 work-related deaths in total – an average of more than one a week – including five children.

Statistics for fatal farms accidents in Ireland were particularly disturbing. Thirty workers lost their lives on Irish farms last year, bringing the total of farms deaths in Ireland in the past ten years to 198. Of those 198 fatal accidents, the Safety Representative Resource Book reveals:

  • 30% of fatalities involved tractors or other farm vehicles
  • 19% of fatalities involved farm machinery
  • 13% of fatalities involved livestock
  • 11% of fatalities resulted from contact with slurry pits
  • 9% of fatalities resulted from falls from height, and
  • 7% of fatalities resulted from being hit by a falling object.

Commenting on the statistics for fatal farm accidents in Ireland, Patricia King said “no job is worth somebody´s life”. She added that “health and safety is non-negotiable” and called on workers throughout Ireland to co-operate with employers and government to prevent a repeat of the fatalities experienced in 2014.

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