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More than half of all official health and safety notices issued in 2021 have been given to the construction industry, with eight related to “inadequate” covid arrangements.
Of the 31 prohibition or improvement notices served so far this year, 16 related to construction sites.
Figures released to Express under the Freedom of Information Law showed that there were 18 Prohibition Notices (where there is a risk of serious personal injury) and 11 Improvement Notices (where there is a breach of the health and safety legislation) served to businesses between January and October 2021 in Jersey.
Pictured: Four of the notices were to do with working from an unsafe height.
Across industries, there were seven incidents across industries of failing to provide "adequate welfare facilities", six of which were on construction sites, and one of which was in an engineering workshop.
Height was also a concern, with four incidents of "unsafe work at height on a construction site."
Looking more broadly at the total enforcement notices for the year across sectors, 13 were related to various covid concerns, ranging from "inadequate arrangements" to minimise the spread, or failure of workers to wear masks.
Pictured: There was a failure to reduce exposure to wood dust in a joinery workshop in August.
All of the covid-related notices were issued within the first half of 2021, peaking in January with five notices served, and decreasing over four months. After April, no more were served.
Other areas enforced that included a failure to write a safe work method for asbestos, risk of falls through incomplete scaffold, unsupported excavation and the failure to "implement a safe system of work" operating a towing trailer in a marine engineering workshop.
Speaking during the Jersey Construction Council's Annual Awards on Saturday, Chair Martin Holmes said that health and safety needed to be "top of the agenda" and that the industry needed to work to eliminate any perceptions of being unsafe as it sought to generate interest in the sector among young people.
07/01/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 on a construction site
08/01/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 on a construction site
22/01/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Cover- 19 on a construction site
28/01/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 on a construction site
08/02/2021 - Unsafe work at height on a construction site
22/02/2021 - Risk of falls though incomplete scaffold
02/03/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 on a construction site
09/03/2021 - Failure to close a business premises when being open to the public was prohibited under Covid-19 legislation
09/03/2021 - Failure by a barber, as a worker in a close contact services premises, to wear a face mask or visor when in the presence of visitors
11/03/2021 - Failure by a worker in a food and drink premises to wear a face mask or visor when in the presence of visitors
22/03/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 on a construction site, including a failure to provide adequate welfare facilities
30/03/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 on a construction site, including a failure to provide adequate welfare facilities
28/04/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 on a construction site, including a failure to provide adequate welfare facilities
29/04/2021 - Unsafe work at height on a construction site
29/04/2021 - Inadequate arrangements to minimise the spread of Covid- 19 in a hospitality premise
23/07/2021 - Unsafe work at height on a construction site
09/09/2021 - Unsafe excavation on a construction site
22/09/2021 - Unsafe work at height on a construction site
20/01/2021 - Failure to inspect and maintain the electrical installation in an engineering workshop
20/01/2021 - Failure to provide adequate welfare facilities in an engineering workshop
20/01/2021 - Failure to have a pressure vessel inspected under a written scheme of examination in a welding workshop
26/01/2021 - Failure by a worker in a food and drink premises to wear a face mask or visor when in the presence of visitors
29/01/2021 - Failure to provide adequate welfare facilities on a construction site
10/02/2021 - Failure to assess and control vehicle and pedestrian segregation at a workplace
29/03/2021 - Failure to prepare a written safe work method statement for work with asbestos
22/06/2021 - Failure to assess and implement a safe system of work for the operation of a towing trailer in a marine engineering workshop
06/08/2021 - Failure to reduce exposure to wood dust in a joinery workshop
06/09/2021 - Failure to provide adequate welfare facilities on a construction site
09/09/2021 - Failure to provide adequate welfare facilities on a construction site
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