Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Wednesday, 25 October 2023
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation
Engagement with Chairperson of the Health and Safety Authority
Ms Patricia Byron:
This is a question I have posed to the executive and, as I say, I am new on the block. It seems to me that we do engage with all of the relevant representative bodies and groups. From the data I have looked at and discussed, the issue seems to be with smaller farms, heights and tractors. I will go back to culture. It seems that when people are working on a farm, some of them do not see themselves as being in a business environment and workplace. The house is on the site. Maybe two or three children live in houses around the environment and it is all their land, whether it is ten acres or 100. That culture is not of a workplace and holding each other to account as you would colleagues in another working environment. I again think back to targeting what the problem is and going after those specific areas like heights and smaller entities, and the sense that a family is not a workplace environment. There is also the gig economy of getting the guy from down the road to bring up his tractor, hoist or whatever and paying him a few bob for the day.