Introduction

The statistics produced by the Health and Safety Executive (‘the Executive’) for fatalities and serious injuries in the construction industry have shown a downward trend since 1974. In the last 20 years there has been a significant reduction in the number and rates of injury in the construction industry, which just happens to coincide with the introduction of the 1994 Construction (Design and Management) Regulations – the ‘CDM Regulations’.

In the 10 years following the introduction of the 1994 Regulations, the improvement in the annual statistics for fatalities was from 5 to 3.5 per 100 000 workers, representing an improvement of 30%. There had been some upward blips in the 10 years after the introduction of the 1994 Regulations but the trend was undeniably downward. In the last 5 years the trend has continued, with an average rate of fatal injury of 2.1 per 100 000 workers, and in 2013/14 there were 2.0 fatal injuries per 100 000 workers (HSE, 2014).