IN Brief:
- The surveyed Accident Incident Rate fell by 4.6% during 2025.
- Self-employed operatives recorded an incident rate 140% above directly employed workers.
- Slips, trips, and falls accounted for 27% of reported accidents.
The Joint Industry Board has recorded a 4.6% improvement in the electrotechnical sector’s Accident Incident Rate through its latest annual survey.
Responses from 68 companies covering 5,372 workers produced an overall rate of 335 during 2025, compared with 351 in 2024. No fatalities or incidents involving contact with electricity were recorded within the submitted data.
The results show a marked difference between employment arrangements, with the Accident Incident Rate among self-employed operatives standing 140% above the rate for directly employed workers.
The self-employed rate was also reported to have risen by 185% compared with 2024. Smaller populations within individual survey groups can produce greater year-to-year volatility, although the difference remains substantial within the submitted sample.
Slips, trips, and falls on the same level represented 27% of reported accidents. Contact with machinery accounted for 25%, falls from height represented 9%, and manual handling or lifting contributed 7%.
The proportion attributed to slips, trips, and falls fell from 52% in the previous survey to 27% in 2025. Although still the largest single category, the reduction changes the balance of risks identified in the latest results.
Employment arrangements form part of the safety environment
Accident rates measure outcomes, but they also reflect the systems surrounding the work. Induction, supervision, task planning, equipment provision, reporting, training, fatigue management, and access to occupational-health support can vary between directly employed and self-employed workforces.
The survey does not establish employment status as the sole cause of the difference because self-employed operatives may work across different project types, durations, and risk profiles. Consistent records on hours worked, task exposure, and subcontracting tiers would be required for a direct causal comparison.
Even so, the figures support closer examination of how responsibilities are transferred through contracting chains. A worker’s legal status does not remove the need for suitable planning, coordination, information, equipment, competent supervision, and effective site controls.
The relationship between workforce structure and competence has also entered parliamentary discussion through the JIB’s work on electrical employment and training standards. Safety, productivity, and delivery of clean-energy infrastructure all depend on verifiable skills and properly managed work.
Slips and trips remain strongly influenced by site organisation because trailing leads, temporary supplies, packaging, incomplete floors, poor lighting, wet surfaces, and congested access routes can expose electrical teams even where the electrical task itself has been planned correctly.
Effective control relies on housekeeping, cable routing, access management, temporary lighting, and coordination between trades. Repeated low-severity incidents can also reveal site conditions capable of producing a more serious fall or contact event.
Machinery-related incidents require careful interpretation because the category can cover hand tools, access equipment, moving plant, and fixed machinery. Isolation and safe systems of work must account for mechanical, electrical, pneumatic, hydraulic, thermal, and stored-energy hazards.
Falls from height represented a smaller proportion of the recorded incidents but retain the potential for severe injury. Selection of access equipment, inspection, edge protection, anchor arrangements, rescue planning, and avoidance of improvised working positions remain central controls.
Manual handling continues to affect cable installation, containment, distribution equipment, transformers, batteries, and other heavy components. Planned delivery routes and mechanical aids are often more effective than relying principally on lifting technique.
The absence of electrical-contact incidents in the sample is positive, although isolation procedures still require sustained attention. Safe isolation depends on correct identification, switching, securing against reconnection, proving the test instrument, testing for dead, and re-proving the instrument.
Near misses and unsafe conditions provide information that accident figures alone cannot capture. A business recording no injuries may still have repeated failures in isolation, access, equipment inspection, or supervision that have not yet produced harm.
Survey participation also affects the results because the figures represent companies that supplied data rather than a complete census of the UK electrotechnical sector. Changes in the responding population can alter the annual rate independently of underlying sector performance.
Consistent definitions and reporting remain essential if the results are to guide prevention. Hours worked, employment status, severity, task, project type, and immediate and underlying causes all increase the usefulness of the data.
The JIB provides health, safety, employment, and training resources through its news and resources service. The 2025 survey records overall improvement, while the employment-status gap and concentration of routine site hazards identify where further analysis and control are required.
