Securing construction sites during school holidays

A stark warning to keep children off building sites where they risk fatal injury has been issued in the lead up to the school holidays by the Health and Safety Executive.

Accidents involving children on construction sites typically arise from a failure to:

- take effective steps to keep children off sites, including preventing access to scaffolding;
- secure and keep plant safe, especially at the end of the working day; and
- store materials on site safely.

Over the last five years, six children have died and 551 have suffered major injuries on sites - including an 9 year old child who died when playing around an unfenced storage area in Yorkshire last year.

The HSE's guidance booklet, 'Protecting the Public - your next move', provides general guidance to the industry on potential hazards to the public from construction activities and ways of controlling them.

Copies of 'Protecting the Public - your next move' (ISBN 0 7176 1148 5, £7.95) can be ordered online or from HSE Books, Tel. (01787) 881165.
This document is for general guidance and research purposes only, and does not purport to give professional advice. Please check the date at the top of the article; the Workplace Law Network retains historic articles for general research.