Jobs often deemed of less risk to health and safety often have higher rates of non-fatal injury than traditionally more dangerous careers, official data has shown.
Provisional data recorded under the Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations (RIDDOR) showed that non-fatal injuries were more frequent in office administrative, office support and other business support activities (144 injuries per 100,000 workers), than in mining and quarrying (118 per 100,000).
Couriers and postal workers (622), residential carers (345), and those working in accommodation (445), and creative, arts and entertainment (310) all suffered higher rates of injury than the entire construction sector (296).
Health and safety training company RRC International reviewed 2022-23 data from the Health and Safety Executive, and found that education careers (152) were more dangerous for non-fatal injuries than electricity, gas and air conditioning supply jobs (149) and the manufacture of electrical equipment (143).
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It also found that librarians and archivists (98) were more likely to hurt themselves at work than manufacturers of basic pharmaceutical products and pharmaceutical preparations (89).
Richard Stockley, managing director at RRC, said: “This data suggests office workers are taking health and safety for granted. Construction and manufacturing, mining and quarrying are more dangerous than office admin or postal work.
“But, while the injuries sustained in those fields are more likely to be very serious, or even fatal, it’s shocking that people working in printing are more likely to hurt themselves on the job than those working with hazardous chemicals and heavy machinery on a daily basis.”
RRC speculate that this is due to the approach those more dangerous industries have to health and safety training. “The construction industry, for example, has a really strong culture of health and safety,” said Stockley, “but that’s not necessarily the case in lower-risk sectors where the approach is much more about doing what they need to in order to be compliant.”
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