HSE guidance states "In relation to RIDDOR, an accident is a separate, identifiable, unintended incident, which causes physical injury. This specifically includes acts of non-consensual violence to people at work. Injuries themselves, eg ‘feeling a sharp twinge’, are not accidents. There must be an identifiable external event that causes the injury, eg a falling object striking someone. Cumulative exposures to hazards, which eventually cause injury (eg repetitive lifting), are NOT classed as ‘accidents’ under RIDDOR

So my question is, if member of staff lifts a box approx 15kg and say they hurt their back , will be off for over 7 days would you report as a Riddor. MH training is in place and up to date

I'm going to say no because there hasn't been an accident.

Yes the injury is caused by an identifiable event-lifting the load. If off work for more that seven days it needs to be reported

I would beg to differ smurf.

I suffer with reoccuring back pain that can be traced back to a "dodgy" lifting operation many years ago (before i became aware of health and safety). A single lift resulted in approx 2 weeks off work, reintroduced on light duties and ultimately a change of career.

The incident resulted in an over 3 day LTI, so I would say it is a yes.

7 day rule applies now!

IMVHO I wouldn't report it as RIDDOR

Steve,

locally as in a different country?

Locally being Guernsey.

Slowly catching up to UK legislation, but it is a slow process.

I cannot see were it mentions a 'sharp twinge' but then again I was just scanning it. and besides if you report it and they feel it is not reportable they just delete it anyway, so can't see the fuss.

If you can tell me what difference it makes if you report or not I will agree! The incident happened due to a work activity which resulted in an accident, because he was actually lifting the item at the time, if the OP said he bent down and felt a twinge prior to engaging in the lifting activity, I would agree that it is not reportable, but he appears to have lifted the item, just because it was only 15kg is not important, it is one of the few regulations were you can take fitness, age, sex etc. into account when assessing and he was off for over 7 days due to the accident.

In that case no manual handling tasks are reportable when someone is injured, unless they drop it on thier fingers toes etc.

Ray and I am using it on my CPD just because I took the time to read and become involved, against my better judgement.

No I wouldn't because the odds are he wouldn't of said, 'hey I just didn't have an injury then' If the box broke and he didn't get hurt i'd say it was a 'near miss'.

The way health and safety is if no-one goes home being injured in work I say I have done my job and if they do get hurt I say the manager didn't do his.

But I have never heard employees whooping as they go out shouting 'yes I didn't get hurt today' have you?

Jodie, investigate by all means. However the information from the original posting states - 'if a member of staff lifts a box approx 15kg and say they hurt their back, will be off for over 7 days would you report as a Riddor'.

The answer is yes, whichever way you cut it.

I'm glad you can be so sure. I personally don't think you can conclude on less than 30 words. Its too open to interpretation hence why we have a yes camp and a no camp.

Work related
over 7 days

But where does it say they were lifting a box as part of their work? they could have been lifting something from their car at lunchtime while running a personal errand. You can't be 100% because it doesn't say it in the post.

Sorry thought it said his lunch!

I wonder if one of the reasons this seems such as divisive subject is that, as stated by the OP, there is a specific description of an accident under RIDDOR.

[Quote; In relation to RIDDOR, an accident is a separate, identifiable, unintended incident, which causes physical injury.]

However a more normal description would usually include the work "unexpected".

That subtly changes this scenario. If the IP had a bad back then it could be assumed that this injury could have resulted from lifting this load, therefore it wouldn't be an accident as it should have been expected and was therefore bad management. Ironically this would then make it non reportable as there wasn't a specific incident that had caused the injury.

However if the IP had previously not ever suffered from back problems then it is much more logical to say that this incident caused the injury even as the straw that broke the camels "ahem" back, following previous bad practice and therefore it would become reportable as there was a specific, identifiable incident that, for the sake of argument, was work related.

I am not trying to offer a solution, but more using this as a thought exercise into why RIDDOR threads always seem to bring out disagreements among posters.

Interpretation always becomes more difficult when our conditioned understanding of language changes under certain legislation

This thread leads me to ask several questions:
1. Why the fear of the RIDDOR? Is it because organisations use the number of RIDDORS as a benchmark and the H&S team know if they start reporting them they will get it in the neck? This is despite the fact that to be honest many RIDDORS are really quite trivial and I have come across really serious situations which are not RIDDOR reportable.
2. What is the point of RIDDOR? Why do we have it? Well from what I have been able to gather from the HSE it is to enable the HSE to collect statistics about workplace injuries. They use this to produce their reports and to pass onto the EU bodies for their benchmarking. The HSE accept that there is under reporting and so they also relay on surveys for example from A&E departments, who are supposed to report any work related injuries to them. This is why I think that this injury should be reported: the HSE will be interested in the number of bad backs related to work and it could end up being passed onto the HSE any way via A&E or some other route anyway.
3. Producing a RIDDOR is not an admission of guilt or liability-not a question but a statement. Do people think that a RIDDOR will automatically bring down a visit from the inspectors; it did not in the past but it might now that we have the fee for intervention regime?
The fact that H&S still argue about what is and is not a RIDDOR leads me to think that this is an area for reform so that we have a clear idea of what we are and are not supposed to report.