EHJ July 2005, pages 20

There can be nothing more distressing than investigating a workplace death. Hampshire detectives Nigel Niven and Chris Yates explain how using the investigators guide can ensure a successful outcome

There was a time when it was generally accepted that people occasionally died at work. Such deaths were frequently treated lightly - after all, accidents happen, don't they? Work can be risky, it's profits that matter. As wrong as this position is, this was a stance all too frequently voiced within the workplace. In more recent years this view has been challenged with serious questions being asked about how deaths can be avoided, how many of these deaths were potentially a criminal offence and what were the police and other agencies doing about it?

Things clearly needed to change and in 1998 they did with the publication of the document Work-related death, a protocol for liaison. The protocol sets out the principles for effective liaison between the organisations responsible for investigating work-related deaths in England and Wales with the police, Health and Safety Executive and the Crown Prosecution Service as signatories.

The thrust of the protocol is the need to work together more effectively and since its publication responses to workplace deaths have significantly improved. In 2001 the protocol was reviewed and updated. The revised version extended the partnership to include the Local Government Association and the British Transport Police. The revised protocol enhances the framework for liaison, and delivers the high standard of professionalism that the public required and deserved.

To improve things, a working party was commissioned in 2003 to produce guidance to assist those actually tasked with investigating deaths in the work place. The working party produced the Investigators guide, which has now been published and is being actively used across England and Wales by investigators from all of the relevant agencies. It serves to provide cohesive and comprehensive guidance in investigating deaths in the workplace by providing a straightforward step-by-step approach to an investigation. The Investigators guide is based on the underlying principles of the protocol and emphasis on a sound investigation and, in particular, the philosophy of joint investigation.

Since the inception of the Investigators guide it has been used successfully on a number of inter-agency investigations. Health and Safety Inspector Joanne Teasdale conducted a successful joint investigation in conjunction with Sussex Constabulary after an explosion at a garage in Peacehaven left an 18-year-old apprentice mechanic with 60 per cent burns. Tragically, he died four days later. The explosion occurred after some fuel was drained from a vehicle and left uncovered overnight in a plastic dustbin. This allowed fumes to build up inside the workshop. The deceased was engulfed in a fireball when he attempted to tip some of the drained fuel into a waste oil tank the next day, the fumes having been sucked into a boiler flue causing the explosion.

Before she attended the scene, Joanne Teasdale obtained a copy of the newly published Investigators guide from the HSE website. A joint investigation ensued between the HSE and the Sussex Constabulary. The manager of the garage was charged with manslaughter and an alternative charge of failing to ensure his own safety and that of other employees. He was found guilty of manslaughter after a trial and sentenced to nine months' imprisonment. "The guide assisted in ensuring what needed to be done was, in fact, done," said Ms Teasdale. "It also laid out the need for liaison between different agencies and set sensible points throughout the investigation when reviews should take place."

Two hundred and thirty five people died in the workplace in 2003/4.

• Work-related death protocol and the Investigators guide

Nigel Niven and Chris Yates are members of the Hampshire Constabulary Major Crime Department. Both sit on the South East Region HSE/ACPO committee and were involved in drafting the Investigators guide on behalf of the National Liaison Committee.