If farm payments were to be linked to farm safety, it could be done so in a positive manner, Pat Griffin, senior agricultural inspector with the Health and Safety Authority (HSA), has said.

He believes there is a need to create a firmer link to tackle the issue. Currently, Irish farmers are seven times more likely to die in a workplace accident than any other industry.

“If you don’t influence the pocket, you won’t influence the farmer,” he told an Agricultural Science Association (ASA) webinar on Wednesday.

However, Griffin stressed he did not want farm safety to be negatively associated with payments: “When I mention linking basic farm payment with safety, people automatically see deductions and penalties. I would switch it completely the other way.”

He believed there should be bonus payments for farmers who are proactive about safety on their farms.

For example, he said farmers could be given a bonus payment for completing a one-day safety course per year or for maintaining farm machinery properly and keeping a record of it.

Inspections

The HSA has completed 539 farm safety inspections in the first half of the year. This is significantly back on the 1,190 completed in the same period last year.

COVID-19 has been blamed for the fall in the number of inspections, with just 59 carried out between 1 March and 8 June.

When asked during the webinar if there should be more farm inspections, Griffin said there should be, but added that increased enforcement would not be the “game-changer”.

“We can’t have farmers waiting for inspectors to arrive on farm to tell them what they need to do, they need to be proactive themselves. They need to do their own checks on the farm and put things right.”