Although they have been the focal point of safety campaigns for many years, falls from height have remained a tragically common workplace occurrence.
In this, the year 2025, it should boggle our minds that workers are still being killed in entirely preventable falls from height. That falls from height remain one of our biggest workplace killers should have our blood running cold. That it has been this way for pretty much the entirety of my 40 years on this planet is absolutely incomprehensible.
There is awareness of the risks of falls, there is understanding of what the consequences of a fall can be and there is knowledge of what can be done to address all that before anyone’s foot even leaves the ground.
So why, then, do fatal falls from height remain so tragically common?
What the data tells us
In the 20 years between 2003 and 2022, Australia recorded an average of nearly 28 workplace deaths resulting from slips, trips and falls of a person every year (27.9, to be exact)
30 people were killed as a result of falls at work in 2023. This represents a rate 7.53% above that two-decade average.
Digging deeper into the details of that data also shows us that older workers (those aged 45 and over) are significantly over-represented in the fatality statistics than younger workers.
What influences workplace decisions?
There are a significant number of variables that are at play when any decision is made at a workplace. From weather on the day through to what actually needs to be accomplished, the workers available and everything in between.
However, there are three main aspects that have the biggest influence. The issue to overcome with these three influences is that any workplace can only prioritise two of them.
That is, out of:
- Managing expense
- Managing time, or
- Managing safety
Only two can be prioritised, with the third been given up as the cost of obtaining the other two.
Successfully managing time and safety will come at the cost of increased expenses. It costs more to provide equipment, increase the number of workers used to complete the task.
Managing expense and safety will come at the cost of time. Things will take longer.
Most often, sadly, the decision is made to prioritise time and cost. The outcome here is that worker safety is left compromised as a result.
Falls from height are unlikely, until they happen
One of the biggest reasons that safety, in particular safety related to falls is often not given priority compared to managing expenses or time is the simple reality that in any one individual instance, the probability of a fatal accident occurring is quite low.
Every day thousands and thousands of different people, in different workplaces, completing different tasks will be involved in working at height in one way or another.
Put next to the (numerically) small number of 30 deaths across the country in a year, it is easy to arrive at the conclusion an accident involving you will not happen.
Once that mindset becomes the norm, then more risky behaviour is undertaken. Each time the accident doesn’t occur becomes evidence that the risky behaviour is acceptable. This encourages increased risk taking.
This compounds over time until, in that one moment, the accident does occur.
The role that clients play in safety
Thinking that riskier behaviour can continue to be undertaken then leads to workers thinking that a job can take less time to complete. The more shortcuts you take, the less time you spend doing things the long way.
This can then feed into the quoting and proposal process, where the proposed expense and time needed to complete a job is reduced. This appeals to businesses on both sides of the equation as the business proposing to do the work is more competitive amongst other proposals.
For the client, there is always a desire to not spend any more money than is absolutely necessary to get the work done. And this is an understandable position to have.
For everyone – whether it be a developer building out a new industrial warehouse or a family building a single-storey home to live in – there is only ever a finite amount of money available to fund the work.
And in a competitive marketplace, like building trades in particular, there is always going to be a proposal that quotes a lower price than the one you have already received.
That desire to find the lowest price further promotes that acceptance of riskier and riskier behaviour being taken by workers to reduce the time and, thus, the expense of completing a job.
Make the difference in falls from height
There is never going to be any one, singular, silver bullet solution when it comes to reducing the number and severity of falls from height.
Unfortunately, the main arsenal of repeated calls to simple “do the right thing” or “work safer” or the threats of increasingly harsh punishments for poor work practices have significant barriers to overcome within the structures of modern workplaces.
Although Height Safety Engineers are specialists within our industry, there is only so much we can only do so much directly. We can design and install best practice fall protection systems. We can provide ongoing compliance and maintenance of those systems. We can train workers in how to safely go about their work. We can provide the equipment to do so.
We can advise and encourage and continue to work to find new ways to influence and guide the safety conversation.
But we cannot make different decisions for people. That is something we all, collectively, need to be doing.
That is how we can make the difference.
Talk to the experts
To start your safety journey towards better protecting people working at heights and in high-risk environments, talk to the experts at Height Safety Engineers.
Our team have been in the business of fall protection for over 20 years, and have the skills, experience and know-how to design, install and certify a best-practice safety system no matter your needs.
Call us on 1300 884 978, email us enquiries@heightsafety.net or fill out the contact form today.
