The Health and Safety Executive has revealed that work-related accidents caused 124 deaths last year, 14 fewer than the previous year.
The new statistics, recorded between 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025, continued a slight downward trend in fatal workplace accidents; for example, in 2004-5 223 work accidents accounted for the loss of 223 lives, and in 1981 the number was 495 – a figure that rose to 600 in one period in the mid 1980s.
The industry with the highest number of deaths was construction, with 35 fatalities. Meanwhile, there were 23 deaths in agriculture, forestry and fishing, and 15 in transportation and storage.
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The leading cause of fatalities was falls from height, which accounted for 35 of the deaths, while 18 were caused by someone being struck by a moving object and 17 by being trapped by something which collapsed or overturned.
Men accounted for the vast majority of deaths (95%), while of some significance was the fact that 40% of the fatal injuries were to workers aged 60 and over, despite that age group only making up 12% of the workforce.
Of the 124 people killed, 49 of them were self-employed. The HSE report noted that the “increased rate for self-employed workers is particularly evident in the agriculture, forestry and fishing sector and administrative and support service activities, where the fatal injury rate to self-employed workers is around two and three times the employee rate, respectively.”
Some 92 members of the public were also killed in work-related accidents in 2024/25 (excluding deaths due to work-related accidents to ‘patients and service users’ in the healthcare and adult social care sectors).
Ruth Wilkinson, head of policy and public affairs at Institution of Occupational Safety and Health, said: “There were nearly two-and-a-half deaths every week last year, so this is no cause for celebration.
“These figures are a reminder of the consequences of when things can and do go wrong. So, we’re calling on businesses to ask themselves if they are doing all they can to prevent accidents, to ensure their people are truly safe and can return home to their families at the end of every working day.
“Businesses need to ensure they are investing in maintaining strong health and safety management systems – with commitment from leadership and worker participation with robust risk management – you can’t put a price on someone’s life.”
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