Posted By Frank Hallett Dear all I found this story via an ISP, but must assume that it's been reported reasonably accurately. Any thoughts on likely LA reactions across the UK? The report reads as follows:- Family mourns conker accident youth Friday September 23, 12:13 AM The parents of a 12-year-old boy who died after he fell on to railings while collecting conkers from a tree have urged all parents to warn their children about the dangers of climbing. It is thought Louis Read, who was known as "Tigger" at school, plunged 15 feet from a tree after a branch snapped at a cricket ground near Rotherham. South Yorkshire Police said the death was being treated as a tragic accident, which occurred while children were collecting conkers. Louis's father Phil, deputy secretary and treasurer for Nottinghamshire Constabulary Police Federation, and his mother Angela, said they were struggling to come to terms with their loss of the "popular and likeable lad". In a statement issued through South Yorkshire Police, they said: "The family are struggling to come to terms with Louis's death and he will be missed so much by so many people. "We would also wish to appeal to other parents, not just in this area, to impress upon their children the dangers of climbing and to be aware of what dangers may be around them while they are out playing." The young boy lived at the family's home in Worksop Road, Woodsetts, Rotherham, with his parents, three brothers - Daniel 19, Lee 17, and Harrison, 18 - and his sister, Anneka, 19. The youngster became impaled on the wrought iron railings around the boundary fence at 5.20pm on Wednesday. A South Yorkshire Police spokeswoman added: "The boy was released by the fire service and airlifted by West Yorkshire Air Ambulance to the Northern General Hospital at Sheffield where, despite undergoing surgery, he died later. "The investigation into the circumstances leading to Louis's death is continuing but it is believed at this stage to be a tragic accident that occurred while children were collecting conkers." Frank Hallett

Posted By Jim Walker Bob, Agree with you entirely. Of course what will happen is that the LAs will say they don't have the money to deal with the issue ("get out of jail card" used by all public funded bodies). Those of us out in the real world are not afforded this luxury. Pity the Press do not see the link between all the taxpayers money paid out in compensation claims and the poor management of these organisations.

Posted By Gareth Bryan When you two have finished the wholly unnecessary act of local authority bashing, check the facts. The fence was at a cricket ground. Local authorities were made aware of the issue in relation to fences around SCHOOLS and are not necessarily even responsible for this particular fence !

Posted By Gareth Bryan That'a OK then, I like a level playing field>

Posted By Robert K Lewis Gareth In 1983 LAs were aware of the problem in all public access areas not just schools. I well remember my employer at the time setting a programme of priority to remove or make safe the points. They too learned from a fatality. Trevor Kletz was absolutely right concerning corporate memory loss. Even if they do not own this ground one presumes that at some point they the inspected it in terms of ground safety. I actually suspect this was an LA owned playing area as many are. It seems odd that the cricket club are not under the spotlight if they owned the ground and trees. Bob

Posted By J Knight Well, good series of questions. But first of all, there is no mention in Frank's original post of this being in any way a culpable act of an LA. There is no statement that the cricket ground or fence is LA owned; Frank's question was 'what would LAs make of it?' This doesn't to me imply that an LA was responsible for this. As for a risk based inspection; there is the question of the state of health of the tree. Trees will shed branches if the force on the branch is excessive; it could be that the person in question stood on something that wouldn't bear their weight. However, the kind of failure likley to lead to a plummet is more likely in a diseased or old tree. So any tree owner should have their trees examined and a risk assessment carried out wherever trees are likely to cause third party damage. This is especially true in parkpland or where there are ornamental boundary trees. An assessment should have identified that a horse chestnut was growing over railings, and remedial action should have been taken, though to be honest the railings are a bit of red herring; falling 15 feet can kill you if you land on grass, the railings just prejudice the outcome. Would I have chopped the conker tree down? No, I like trees. I might have put a barrier around its base so the kids could only throw sticks at it, in the traditional manner, instead of climbing it which is an unfair advantage when it comes to conker collecting, John

Posted By J Knight Agreed Bob, pointy railings are a hazard, and there are issues of corporate memory. I remember a while ago the NHS launched a programme called 'A Learning Organisation' which was intended to address this kind of thing. Unfortunately that initiative has been forgotten.... But while this isn't about conkers, or cricket, it also isn't really about railings, the child fell almost 5 metres, they could have landed on a playground safety apron from that height and died. There are wider questions about acceptable risk, and controls on children, and some of this relates to the thread about running elsewhere on this forum. While not wishing at all to gainsay the very valid comments about the dangers of sharp rails, this child would probably have died after landing on neatly scalloped edges, considering the height of the fall, John

Posted By Paul Cook Is the world going mad? Are we traveling further down the road towards our super nanny state? Climbing trees is a risky! Falling from a tree into a grade 5 river or onto a railway could prove just as terminal as falling onto a spikey fence. Should we dam the rivers and slow down the trains to prevent similar events from taking place?? Unfortunate and tragic as this may be, society (guided by safety professionals not ambulance chasers) should be encouraged to use these events to educate people of the dangers of real life rather than racing to encapsulate, label, sign, close down or ban anything which may involve some kind of risk.

Posted By J Knight Rob, 'only fallen 15 feet'. Yes, people do survive falls from that height, and yes, the railings did more or less guarantee fatality. But really, the most likley outcome from a 15 foot fall onto a metal bar with or without spikes is an injury; ranging from more or less serious bruising, to fractures, brain injury, or death. Falling onto a flat surface could do the same. No, we don't want to fence in and restrict access to natural features. A Horse Chestnut tree in a recreation ground though is not a natural feature, any more than a fence (with or without spiky railings). Somebody put it there, somebody keeps it there, and they should manage it and its surroundings, John

Posted By Robert K Lewis Lets not forget the ubiquitous environmentally friendly death traps called chestnut stake fencing. Bob

Posted By Robert K Lewis RJ Perhaps the problem is actually that society in general and institutions in particular suffer from the memory loss over time and begin to omit the measures that they used to have or forget the reason why they are there until the next time. The child fatality is an example of this in action. The control is a real problem. As soon as a generation who dealt with the accident retire or move on to fresh pastures the problems start to germinate afresh. When we record assessments it is vital to be clear why they are made and not start afresh because we obviously are better at assessment today, ouch bit too hard on my tongue there. Solutions may therefore be at a system level to prevent corporate amnesia. Bob

Posted By R Joe We don’t really seem to have bottomed this one out yet. We have views ranging from: ‘the responsible authority should be held up to everybody's view for their abject failure to rectify a known significant cause of child fatalities’, to, ‘by trying to remove all possible hazards from areas of day to day life, which present risks having a relatively low chance of occurance, we will be further reducing the ability of joe public to make any kind of informed decision’. Surley a collective, considered risk assessment by the hundrerds of health and safety professionals who use this forum should be able to get us a bit nearer to some sort of consensus, particularly if we are going to be the champions of ‘sensible health and safety’ and explain to others what it means with real life examples – like this one. Regards RJ