A reader writes: The facts of death

Your interview with the widow of Patrick O’Sullivan dated Friday 16 July obviously stresses the emotions of Patrick’s wife Mary and children John, 33, and Maggie, 32. In the same issue, on page 52, Chris Hill wrote about the forthcoming corporate killing bill.

Mr O’Sullivan tragically fell from a platform tower, put in place by somebody else, while he was pouring pumped concrete. The risk involved with this method is tremendously high, and am sure the Health and Safety Executive will examine the methods in use at this work station.

Over the years, I have found pumping concrete to be fraught with risks – and I experienced this recently, when there was a fatal accident on the site where I work.

This involved pumping concrete in a high-risk area. In my opinion, it should never have been allowed to proceed in the first place.

I have not yet been called by the HSE to give my statement, although I suspect this will be needed in due course – especially since on the same site a week before, I witnessed another concrete contractor pouring pumped concrete into columns with rebar projecting three-quarters of a metre from the ground-floor slab, with men working off an unguarded platform.

This is not an isolated instance. On construction sites I have worked on over the past 40 years, have often witnessed similar short cuts being taken. I deal with these as best befits the situation at the time.

Of course, the understaffed HSE carries out as many fair investigations as it can, but it does not always track back to see whether “check and check again” procedures were applied on site on an hour-by-hour basis.

Reputable contractors will have the checklist required by the Construction (Health, Safety and Welfare) Regulations. However, I am sure they are not completed as often as they should be. I have many times seen these lists left unsigned, simply because the supervisors responsible for signing them were not brave enough, trained enough, paid enough or had time enough so to do.

The questions raised by both of these articles concerned who should be blamed for a site fatality.

The answer is: everyone.

Of course, reputable contractors will say that the individual worker on a construction site is responsible for their own individual safety. But this cannot be the whole story. The Health & Safety at Work Act, introduced in 1974, emphasised that any party immediately involved with an accident, especially one that involves a fatality, is guilty until they can reasonably prove they were innocent or unaware of the risks involved at that particular workstation.

And contractors must complete their checklists, and they must spend the time and money needed to educate workers about the specific risks associated with particular workstations and operations.

Does this responsibility extend to the boardroom? Although I have every sympathy with Mary, John and Maggie’s feelings, and their desire to see some company directors put behind bars, this is unlikely to lead to a significant reduction in fatalities. In general, I must agree with Chris Hill’s statement that a significant reduction in fatalities is most likely to be achieved by transformation in individuals rather than corporations.

What I disagree with is Mr Hill’s statement that culture change should be top-down. It should begin simultaneously at the top, the bottom and the middle.

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