Workplace accidents, or occupational injuries, occur when an employee suffers injuries during the course of their employment.

Brigid O’Donnell, Solicitor, a native of Cashel, Tipperary with offices in Clonmel, Tipperary and Cork city has successfully recovered compensation for clients who have suffered injuries- ranging from minor injuries to life-changing catastrophic injuries- due to workplace accidents. She has also successfully recovered compensation for families who have lost loved ones due to workplace accidents.

Employers are obliged under Health and Safety Legislation to ensure, so far as is practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work, of their employees.

Employers must prepare a risk assessment and safety statement identifying potential hazards. Once hazards, or risks to safety, have been identified; employers must then exercise due care to put in place the necessary protective and preventative measures to prevent said risks from arising.

Many workplace accidents can be avoided by way of the preparation and implementation of an adequate risk assessment and safety statement.

However, from our experience, it is more regularly the case that employers fail to draft policies which identify all potential hazards, fail to implement their own policies, or fail to update their policies in accordance with changes in the workplace. This amounts to a failure in the duty of care owed to employees, or negligence.

The 2005 Act also places specific obligations on employers to:

(a) manage and conduct work activities in such a way as to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the safety, health and welfare at work of employees;
(b) manage and conduct work activities in such a way as to prevent, so far as is reasonably practicable, any improper conduct or behaviour likely to put the safety, health or welfare at work of his or her employees at risk;
(c) provide a safe place of work including safe methods of access and egress;
(d) ensure, as far as practicable, that no use of any article or substance or exposure to noise, vibration or ionising radiations or other physical agents will cause a risk to health at work of its employees.
(e) provide/implement safe systems of work;
(f) provide and maintain welfare facilities;
(g) provide the information, instruction, training and supervision necessary to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable the safety, health and welfare at work of his or her employees;

If an employer fails to comply with their obligations pursuant to the Health and Safety Legislation and an employee suffers injury as a direct result of that failure, the employee will have grounds for a personal injuries claim.

There is no doubt that some working environments are more hazardous than others. For example, sadly, the Construction and Farming sectors have always proven to be particularly perilous working environments.
38 people lost their lives due to workplace accidents in 2020 and 2021. Almost 75% of these fatalities occurred in the farming and construction sector.

While this is the lowest number of fatalities on record since the HSA (Health and Safety Authority) began to collate this information in 1989, the tragic, avoidable loss of one life is one too many. The most common causes of death in the context of fatal workplace accidents included falling from a height, or the loss of control of a vehicle, or one of its attachments.

However, accidents can and do arise in every sector.

While obviously the 2022 report is skewed to a certain extent in that it is based on data relating to 2020 and 2021, which were outliers due to the COVID Pandemic and associated restrictions, it is worrying that the 2021 figures relating to non-fatal injuries demonstrated an 8% increase on the 2020 figures.

The most common injuries are back injuries while lifting, trip/slip and falls, injuries to upper limbs and work-related stress/anxiety.

Common workplace accidents and injuries: