School: Advice please. I have recommended an incident be reported to RIDDOR and my line manager has gained opposite advice from them. The occurrence was verbally reported that a child had slipped/trip on the floor during drama, and an ambulance called and he was taken to hospital. I recommended we report to RIDDOR to cover ourselves. It now appears that the accident report shows he was tripped and the feed back from RIDDOR was no, because of that; 1. It occured in an activity at the school. 2. Pupils were involved. 3. It was caused by a student triping another. 4. The pupil went from school to Hospital. Now was I correct in my first assumption and would that still apply for the second as it was a supervised activity? Are children in school considered the same as if they were general public? Is it better to be belt and braces or not?

Thank you Mike W that is very helpful. I can see a number of ways to read/interpret it. I don't see however the "horseplay" that RIDDOR mentioned that was not reportable even though it was a supervised activity. many thanks though bentoby

I concur with Wood28983 - not reportable. Zyggy

The guidance mentioned in the above link states that the accident should be reported if it results in a trip to the hospital. It's only not reportable if it's a minor playground accident. Yes it mentions "not usually reportable... unless inadequate supervision" but this cannot supercede the regulation which states that a hospital visit is automatically reportable (and it has already stated MUST after hospital visit in the previous column so this is very clear).

The bit about the trip to hospital only applies if the accident is deemed 'work related'. Whether an accident is work related or not overrides any other requirement. Two children messing about is not generally deemed to be work-related unless it can be shown that it was due to inadequate supervision.

Just because a pupil pays a visit to hospital does not automatically make it reportable. As stated previously, there has to be either an act or omission on the part of the school to have caused an injury, e.g. child trips on a pot-hole in the playground, is injured, & is taken to hospital - reportable; two children bang their heads together whilst playing & are taken to hospital - not reportable (although I know that many Primary Heads do this automatically, "just in case"!)

Hi Bentoby I was once told by an HSE inspector that they have issues with companies that hide RIDDOR reportables, not ones that have made a error or misinterpreted what is a complex badly written framework document. He noted that so long has a company has investigated and made a determination (recorded) on why they have not reported an incident then there is little chance of come back. This relates to issues that are borderline - if the lad fell and broke his leg whilst walking then its cut and dry - it should be reported. Throughout your career you will have many instances where the duty to report is borderline - as part of the investigation ring the HSE ask their advice, note down time date and who you spoke to and the advice - make the decision inform your organisation and move on to the next problem.

Hi Barnaby The idea is that eventually he would get the confident and experience not to have to call any one, surely the idea of the posts is to give advice so people gain experience that will negate them needing to ask for advice about the same issue again.