The Environmental Services Association (ESA) has pledged to continue work to spread best practice on health and safety in the waste sector, after reporting a 32% reduction in injuries across its membership in 2015.
The waste industry trade body today (21 November) offered an update on health and safety amongst its members as part of its aim to accomplish a ‘zero harm workplace’ within the waste sector – part of its Accident Reduction Charter, first launched in 2004, and renewed in 2014 (see letsrecycle.com story).
ESA has highlighted data submitted by its members on health and safety
Today’s update includes analysis of latest data on health and safety submitted by ESA’s members up to the end of 2015 – compared to figures published by the Health and Safety Executive of the wider waste and recycling sector, including data published this month (see letsrecycle.com story).
According to the ESA, the latest figures submitted by members suggest that the reduction in injuries in 2015, down from 919 per 100,000 in 2014 to 628 per 100,000 represents the single largest reduction in accidents since the launch of the Charter in 2014. One fatality was recorded within the ESA data for 2015, the same number as in 2014.
ESA has claimed that the data indicates there is a disparity between safety performance amongst ESA members and with the wider waste management industry.
“ESA’s RIDDOR [Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrence Regulations] of 628 in 2015 remains lower than the (provisional) injury rate of 1,854 as reported by HSE for the waste management industry as a whole, while over the six year period from 2009-2015 the 67.5% reduction in injuries achieved by ESA Members was not mirrored by the industry as a whole (17.5% reduction),” ESA has noted in its analysis.
‘Variation’
Commenting on the figures, ESA’s policy advisor, Stephen Freeland said: “While there is certainly no room for one-upmanship when it comes to health and safety it is nonetheless important to help shed light on the variation in performance that exists within our industry.
“We hope that our report and data update will allow for resources to be better targeted on those areas which can bring about most meaningful improvement in the industry’s overall performance. Going forward, ESA will continue to work to ensure that “lessons learnt” and best practice is disseminated for the benefit of all”.
Further analysis of the figures indicates that slips, trips & falls were responsible for a third of all non-fatal injuries reported by ESA Members in 2015. Together, slips, trips & falls; manual handling & impact injuries make up nearly 80% of all reported incidents. There has been little variation in this trend between previous reporting years, ESA says.
Elsewhere, ESA notes that waste collection activities remain the most hazardous aspect of the waste management industry’s operations, with the majority of non-fatal injuries in 2015 (60%) associated with such activities.
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Source: letsrecycle.com Waste Managment
