Decline in the Number of Violent Incidents in the Work Place

Friday, 21st February 2014

Good news for the care sector; the HSE has recently reported there has been a decline in the number of violent incidents occurring in the workplace over the last ten years, and that fortunately cases of such events have remained stable over the last four years.

The Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) measures respondents’ experiences of crime-related incidents and classifies these into offence types (including physical assaults and threats), and also collects detailed information about the nature of the victimisation. The CSEW defines violence at work on the basis of type of offence (assaults or threats); what the victim was doing at the time of the incident (at work or working); and the relationship between victim and offender Physical assaults include assault with injury, assault without injury and robbery; threats include verbal threats made to or against the respondent.

The survey found that in 2012/13 the risk of being a victim of actual or threatened violence at work in 2012/13 is similar to the last few years with an estimated 1.4 per cent of working adults the victims of one or more violent incidents at work.

Strangers were the offenders in 60 per cent of cases of workplace violence. Among incidents where the offender was known, the offenders were most likely to be a business client or a member of the public known through work. The report found that 1.2 per cent of women and 1.6 per cent of men were victims of violence at work once or more during the year prior to their interview.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is publishing this report as part of its responsibility for developing and implementing policy on work-related violence. The HSE has published a wide range of guidance on the prevention and management of work-related violence, and works in partnership with other bodies (including the Home Office, other government departments, employers, trades unions and local authorities), to raise awareness of the issue and share good practice.

For more in depth analysis of this survey as well as information on Managing Work Related Violence then visit the HSE website http://www.hse.gov.uk/statistics/causing/violence/index.htm