Chief inspector of construction Stephen Williams told B&E online today the HSE wants to make safety a part of mainstream culture. He spoke as the executive launched a campaign in Manchester to target the refurbishment sector.

“There are an awful lot of small firms in this sector,” he said. “Targeting these people is one of the biggest problems for the HSE. We’ve got to get people in the UK talking about safety. Just like what’s happened with the drink driving campaign, we’ve got to make people unaccustomed to deaths in the construction industry.”

The campaign repeats an exercise in falls and trips the HSE carried out on refurbishment sites last June and July, in which the executive stopped work on one-third of sites.

“What I’m asking my inspectors to do is to devote a week in the month to target refurbishment sites,” Williams said.

“The previous campaign shows that we were targeting the right sites. I’m hoping that the standards will have improved during this campaign.”