Research

Subcontractor Health And Safety In The Construction Industry

This project was the primary focus for a Master of Education, honours (Adult Education and Training) studied through the University of New England, Armidale, 2002-2005. The actual title of the thesis was: Learning safety in the construction industry: a subcontractor’s perspective.

Following is a short abstract from this thesis.

Abstract

This study is an exploratory ethnographic study of building subcontractor’s constructions of safety within the culture of the domestic housing sector of the building and construction industry in order to improve occupational health and safety education. Eleven subcontractors from varying trades were interviewed using an in-depth semi structured interviewing technique about their safe working practices and how they learned to work safely. Information was also gathered from participants of OHS courses, and from other subcontractors who wanted to have their say on safety.

All information gathered was analysed and coded into themes that arose from the words of the participants. It became apparent that subcontractors want to be safe at work, and take pride in the way they manage their safety. The construction safety culture is a vibrant and constantly changing phenomenon. It results from the balancing of many pressures, the three most pervasive of which are the necessity to be independent at work, the need to be safe, and the need to be financially viable.

What emerged from the data is that there are now two aspects to occupational health and safety. The first is how it has traditionally been seen, and that is that the subcontractors definitely do not want to get hurt at work, and therefore they work as safely as possible. The second is that the subcontractors now also have to work legally safe, which is not always seen as the safest or most efficient way to work, and one’s financial viability is often perceived to be threatened by the prescriptions of OHS legislation.

Despite the subcontractors’ insistence that they want to be safe at work, there is a high degree of injury resulting from the performance of construction work. Recommendations have been made for further research that will help design better educational experiences for building workers in the hope that this will help reduce the toll that their work takes on their bodies.

Other Publications On Subcontractors

Further research has expanded the knowledge gained during the study which resulted in the thesis. Phil regularly talks to subcontractors, hears stories at OHS courses that he runs, and observes their safety behaviours; he records this information in investigator diaries and personal journals, and used the data to further understand the safety culture of subcontractors in both the housing industry and civil construction. He has published other findings that combine information from the primary thesis research with that of the subsequent research (see list of publications).

Phil is a specialist construction industry OHS researcher with a passion for making the industry safer for all the workers.