- The Health and Safety at Work Act received Royal Assent on 31 July 1974
- The TUC estimates there have been at least 14,000 fewer workplace fatalities since 1974
- More than a decade of cuts to health and safety enforcement is endangering workers, says TUC
The TUC is championing the Health and Safety at Work Act (HSWA) as life-saving legislation as trade unions mark the 50th anniversary of its Royal Assent today (Wednesday).
The HSWA was the first legislation to mandate health and safety in all workplaces.
Despite the major life-saving progress made since the Act became law, Britain still averaged more than 100 work-related deaths each year for the past decade.
The TUC is calling on the new government to build on the success of the Act, and to provide the fresh funding needed to consign all work-related deaths to history.
The Health and Safety Act 1974
In 1970, Employment Secretary Barbara Castle commissioned Lord Robens to chair a committee to review provisions for the health and safety of workers.
The Robens Report, published in 1972, laid the groundwork for what became the Health and Safety at Work Act. And it recommended a new health and safety authority, which was enabled by the Act and became the Health and Safety Executive.
In 1977, the Act was accompanied by the Safety Reps and Safety Committees Regulations, which gave rights to trade union safety reps (for example, the right to inspect workplaces).
Lives saved since 1974
The Robens report stated that “Every year something like 1,000 people are killed at their work in this country”.
In 1974, when the current official data begins, there were 651 workplace fatalities. From 1974 onwards, fatalities steadily declined.
Since 2013, there have been fewer than 150 fatalities in every year. In 2023 there were 138 fatalities but there has not yet been a year with fewer than 100 fatalities.
Based on data from the Robens report and the official data since 1974, the TUC estimates that there have been at least 14,000 fewer fatal injuries in the workplace since the Act became law.
Without the HSWA the number of deaths relating to occupational illness would have been higher too.
The TUC says that while the HSWA has played a major role in the reduction in workplace fatalities, it was not the only factor. Britain’s economic transition away from heavy industry to service sectors is also likely to have reduced workplace fatalities, as have additional rights for unions to act in workers’ defence.
Raising standards and reducing fatalities and injuries
As the new government seeks to boost housebuilding and to revive Britain’s manufacturing base with the Green Prosperity Plan, the TUC says that workers must have a higher standard of health and safety protection than in previous generations.
The TUC is calling for the government to:
- Restore adequate funding to the Health and Safety Executive
- Take action to speed up the removal of asbestos from all workplaces
- Protect the role of trade union health and safety reps, and allow unions to enter and organise workplaces that lack union representation
- Foster a culture of positive industrial relations so that employers and workers both benefit from a collaborative approach to improving health and safety
TUC General Secretary Paul Nowak said: “The Act made it a duty for every employer to protect the health and safety of staff. Thousands of lives have been saved since then. It shows how valuable government can be when put at the service of working people.
“All deaths, injuries, and illnesses at work are preventable. But workplace inspections and prosecutions have plummeted because of Conservative cuts. And more than a hundred people died from work-related injuries last year.
“We need fresh funding and fresh thinking. Government, unions and employers must work together to raise workplace safety to the next level. Every worker deserves to be safe, wherever they work and whatever they do.”
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