Pictures on site help migrant workers’ safety

Deaths and injuries among UK-based migrant construction workers could be reduced if pictures were used in safety training – according to new research.

The project, commissioned by the Institution of Occupational Safety and Health (IOSH) and carried out by Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU), reveals that migrant workers’ understanding of building site health and safety improves when images are used in training. And from these results, IOSH is urging construction companies to include illustrations as standard in their safety training sessions.

Statistics from the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) show that migrant workers in the construction sector are more likely to be fatally injured than those native to the UK. In fact, six per cent of Britain’s 2.3m construction workers are migrants, yet they account for a disproportionate 17 per cent of work-related deaths in that sector. Between April 2005 and March 2008, 25 foreign workers were killed in the UK construction industry.

IOSH executive director of policy Dr Luise Vassie said: “Despite the fact employers have a legal duty to make safety information understandable to all employees, these figures show that some construction companies can do more to make sure staff whose first language isn’t English know how to stay safe on-site.”

The man behind the project, GCU senior research fellow Billy Hare MCIOB, instructed health and safety training to be delivered to over 80 migrant workers, across four construction sites in London and Manchester. He used a combination of sketch drawings, pictograms and photos to translate the safety message. Test scores showed their knowledge levels from pictorial images were always higher, some increasing by 20 per cent.

He said: “This improvement shows that there is currently a gap in migrant worker training, as crucial occupational safety and health information can be lost in translation. After all, the standards, work methods and equipment used on UK building sites can be different to those that migrant workers are familiar with, so they may need extra support with understanding the risks a completely new environment presents.”

Vassie added: “Based on these results, we might assume the number of migrant worker injuries and deaths on building sites could be cut if images were used as standard in training.  We’d urge construction companies to take this on and we’d also encourage management to consider this worker group more when looking at their health and safety systems.”

Some of the main reasons for migrant worker injuries highlighted by HSE inspectors have been language skills, cultural differences and inexperience or lack of understanding of UK health and safety standards. But while employers are increasingly putting measures such as translated instructions and multi-lingual supervisors in place, Hare believes this could be ineffective and the wrong approach.

He said: “Companies need to do more than just translate health and safety training into their workers’ first languages. Doing this alone can actually lead companies into a false sense of security because, in fact, many workers – whatever their country of origin – have literacy issues. We can’t assume that everyone is able to read instructions, so pictures overcome these issues and enhance what already exists.” 

“After the project, one building site carried on using the images by placing them around the site. Once these cropped up in employees’ day-to-day work, behaviour improved and remained high, showing that revisiting the messages on a regular basis can change the way people actually work,” Hare added.

Employees from four different construction sites – three in London, one in Manchester – were selected to take training. Two sites went through two sessions of text-based health and safety training, while the others took two training sessions with pictorial images.

Both before and immediately after training they were given a 24-question knowledge test – six per theme – to see what their competency levels were. There were also eight observational criteria testing behaviour across each of the themes. This test was sat again one month later, to gauge how well knowledge had been retained and whether their behaviour had been affected long term.

Test scores showed their knowledge levels from pictorial images were always higher – as much as 20 per cent in some cases. And one month later knowledge scores were still high – some being 100 per cent.

After pictorial interventions, scores increased from 11.35 to 11.95 out of 12 on A and B. After intervention, scores decreased with text by 0.20. Where C and D were concerned, scores with pictorial images went from 11.03 to 11.95, while the improvement with text-based training alone was smaller.