Accidents can happen at any time, anywhere, despite what is put in place. This is why the need to investigate exists. Incident reporting and the investigation of them is a foundation on which an effective health and safety management is built.
The Statistics
The most recent figures for 2024 to 2025 show:
- 1.9 million working people suffered or are still suffering from a work-related illness, of which:
- 964,000 workers reported work-related stress/depression/anxiety
- 511,000 workers reported a work-related musculoskeletal disorder
- 124 workers were killed in work-related accidents
- 680,000 working people sustained injuries at work
- 59,219 injuries to employees were reported under RIDDOR
- 40.1 million working days were lost due to work-related illness or workplace injury
- £23 billion is the estimated cost to employers
The Importance of Investigations
The above figures demonstrate that a dedicated focus is still required for investigations. It is crucial that accidents, relevant incidents or dangerous occurrences are sufficiently investigated to ensure the continuing safety of workers and to prevent recurrence.
A warning about recurrence was made explicitly by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE): “To have one accident is bad enough, but to have another because lessons were not learned is inexcusable.”
From this, we should understand that a failure to investigate previous incidents or learn lessons from them is likely to be deemed as an aggravating feature in any further related incident.
Creating a document that shows the investigative process and its results not only demonstrates how the process occurred but, crucially, what will be done to address the root causes.
A robust reporting system, a culture of transparency, and timely corrective actions can all significantly enhance an organisation’s workplace safety. It should be a business goal to not only be legally compliant but to proactively provide a safer work environment.
Resources
HSE has specifically developed and provided a workbook to help employers, unions, safety representatives, and professionals find out what went wrong after an accident or incident and identify how the risk can be easily avoided. This is available from their website at investigating accidents and incidents (HSG245).
At Kingfisher, we also provide guidance and document templates to assist in the conducting of and recording of the findings of any accident investigative process. These are accessible to our H&S clients via the Portal, or please feel free to get in touch for help.
Our team are able to talk through an investigative process and help management understand how to get the best out of it. Please do not hesitate to get in touch for assistance.