A campaign of 406 Health and Safety Authority inspections focusing on machinery in May found non-compliance on most farms visited. Enforcement notices served on 52 farmers targeted serious offences and can prohibit the use of a machine. One of the main reasons was the absence of PTO guards. “It can reduce the risk of fatality to nearly zero if you have it, yet some farmers are taking the risk,” senior HSA inspector Pat Griffin told the Irish Farmers Journal.
A campaign of 406 Health and Safety Authority inspections focusing on machinery in May found non-compliance on most farms visited. Enforcement notices served on 52 farmers targeted serious offences and can prohibit the use of a machine. One of the main reasons was the absence of PTO guards.
“It can reduce the risk of fatality to nearly zero if you have it, yet some farmers are taking the risk,” senior HSA inspector Pat Griffin told the Irish Farmers Journal.
Inspectors also issued 199 reports with lists of improvements to be made by farmers, “many to do with machinery maintenance”, Griffin added.
Listen to "Inspections reveal machinery risks" on Spreaker.
There was good news on tractor handbrakes and cabs, with 97% and 91% respectively found to be in good order. However, one in five tractors had inadequate mirrors, a concern “given the number of people who have been reversed over,” Griffin said.
The HSA found that only one in 10 farmers had received formal training on driving a tractor or a quad.
“There are courses out there and I believe it would reduce deaths if farmers availed of them,” Griffin said. He welcomed the attention from a Fianna Fáil bill to make roll bars and helmets compulsory on quads, but warned that training, maintenance and route planning were more important in ensuring quad safety.
The HSA is now planning its next campaign of farm inspections in October, focusing on work at heights and falling objects such as bales.
There were three farm deaths from falls last October, and Griffin urged farmers to share a rented mobile elevated work platform with neighbours for buildings maintenance ahead of the winter.
He also supported an IFA initiative for farmers to give each other safety advice.
“If a farmer is in their workplace day in, day out, they don’t know what is risky. Another pair of eyes from a farmer down the road will see it fairly quickly,” he said.
The HSA will offer demonstrations of quad safety, PTO entanglement and work at heights at the National Ploughing Championships, stand 299, block 4, row 14.
Read more about quad safety this weekend on farmersjournal.ie
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