Findings Report: SafeWork Falls from heights 2025 - all industries

In 2025 SafeWork NSW undertook awareness, education, enforcement and engagement activities to prevent falls from heights across all industries in NSW. This report summarises activities and findings.

Project timeframe: 01/08/2025 - 31/10/2025

Sites visited: 935

Summary and overview

A key priority for SafeWork NSW is reducing the risk of death or injury due to falls from heights, as outlined in the 25-26 Annual Regulatory Statement (PDF, 1186.3 KB):

In recent years workers have died or been seriously injured due to falls from ladders, scaffolds, roofs, vehicles and building edges. Many incidents involve basic failures like missing edge protection or unsafe access.

Falls from heights occurs in all industries, from construction, healthcare, transport, warehousing, manufacturing and agriculture to retail.

This project aimed to strengthen industry compliance and reduce serious incidents and fatalities, through a coordinated approach, focusing on awareness, education, enforcement and engagement across all industries in NSW.

SafeWork NSW worked with a range of industry stakeholders to reach key duty holders in all workplace sectors to assess risks and consult workers, managers, supervisors, and business owners, in conjunction with health and safety representatives (HSR) to implement higher-order controls and ensure a safe workplace.

Key findings

  • The risk of falling from one level to another continues to be a significant workplace safety hazard.
  • Nearly half of all Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking (PCBU) do not have adequate system in place to manage the risk of falls from heights.
  • When working on scaffolds and building edges (for example 1st/2nd floor, balconies), there continues to be a risk of falls from heights.
  • Although compliant during these visits, safety controls will continue to be assessed when working on ladders or accessing the workplace via steps and stairways.
  • Inspectors did find PCBUs had a system of work in place to ensure workers were provided with adequate information, instruction and training.  Workers were also for the most part supervised when working at heights.
  • The majority of PCBUs had a system of work in place to ensure workers/ contractors/ others have been effectively consulted on work at heights.
  • Most PCBUs use higher order controls when it comes to falls from heights risks.

During the course of the project $223,950 in on-the-spot fines and 1058 compliance notices were issued.

Awareness-raising communications

SafeWork's 2025 ‘She’ll be right – Not when working at heights’ campaign aimed to advise PCBUs and Principal Contractors (PC) of the dangers of falls from heights, promote SafeWork NSW resources and provide advice, guidance and support to workers and PCBUs about the importance of safety when working at heights.

Communications included a social media campaign on Facebook (Meta) and LinkedIn, stakeholder articles and direct messaging to promote our activities.

Evaluation of the campaign indicates the engagement metric through Meta and LinkedIn reached 507k users and delivered 870k impressions which means the messaging was effective in reaching our target audience.  In addition to the social media campaign, an article ‘No job is worth the risk - Work safely at any height’ was also circulated to over 17k construction stakeholders through the SafeWork Wrap newsletter.

Inspector pro-active compliance/verification site visits

Workplace sectors

Inspectors visited 935 workplaces including:

  • Construction - 745
  • Manufacturing - 68
  • Retail / Trade - 59
  • Transport / Storage - 24
  • Agriculture – 6

Occupations

Inspectors spoke to a range of professions in the workplaces and more than one at time, below are the highest categories of workers spoken to across NSW:

  • Site Supervisors - 250
  • Business Owners - 158
  • Managers - 114
  • Site Supervisors and Workers – 72
  • Workers - 51
  • Managers and Workers – 46
  • Business Owners and Workers – 33

Inspector observations

Inspectors undertook verifications and recorded on-site observations, to capture the safety and compliance rates for general falls risks, as well as for specific falls from heights risks when working on roofs, ladders, scaffold, steps and stairways, mezzanines, building edges, voids/penetrations, loading and unloading vehicles, excavations, formwork and silos.  
These findings outline the percentage of workplaces that either had or did not have safety measures in place where relevant to the workplace.

General site observations

Are there any instances where workers or others are at risk of falling from one level to another? (For example accessing mezzanines, accessing tall shelves, ladder use, building edges, work on roofs, or unloading trucks).

  • Yes 76%
  • No 24%

Is there safe access and egress in place for work at heights?

  • Yes 72%
  • No 28%

Does the PCBU have an adequate system in place to manage the risk of falls from heights?

  • Yes 55%
  • No 45%

Does the PCBU use higher order controls when it comes to falls from heights risks, as appropriate?

  • Yes 72%
  • No 28%

Does the PCBU have a system of work in place to ensure workers are provided with adequate information, instruction and training?

  • Yes 82%
  • No 18%

Are workers being supervised when working at heights, as appropriate?

  • Yes 79%
  • No 21%

Does the PCBU have a system of work in place to ensure workers/contractors / others have been effectively consulted on work at heights?

  • Yes 82%
  • No 18%

Specific falls from heights risks identified

Ladders – when working on ladders, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 75%
  • No 25%

The inspections revealed that working on ladders is generally compliant on construction sites and in workplaces, however, it is difficult to observe ladder use as they are usually used for a short duration, and this level of compliance does not reflect workers compensation claims which attribute a significant portion of falls injuries to ladders.

Steps and stairways – when accessing the workplace via steps and stairways, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 77%
  • No 23%

The inspections revealed that steps and stairways were generally compliant in workplaces, however it should be noted that workers compensation claims attribute a significant portion of injuries occur when using steps or stairways.

Scaffold - when working on scaffolds, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 51%
  • No 49%

A compliant scaffold keeps workers safe when undertaking construction and/or finishing work to a building or structure.  However, poorly installed or inadequately maintained scaffolds can pose serious falls or collapse risks.  The inspections found that nearly half the scaffold inspected did not adequately control the risk of falls from heights.

Roofs - when working on roofs, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 60%
  • No 40%

When it comes to work on roofs, whilst 60% of sites had higher order controls in place, such as scaffold, roof guard rails or elevated work platforms, it is clear that a significant number did not have adequate systems to manage the risk of falls.

Mezzanines – when working on mezzanines, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 63%
  • No 37%

When working on mezzanines most inspections identified an unacceptable falls risk.

Other building edges - (for example 1st/2nd floor, balconies) – when working on other building edges, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 53%
  • No 47%

Voids/penetrations – when working near voids/penetrations, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 64%
  • No 36%

Other building edges - (for example 1st/2nd floor, balconies) were also observed as a significant area of concern for SafeWork NSW, with nearly half being unprotected from falls.  More than a third of voids and penetrations were also unprotected.  In addition, nearly a third of workplaces had no safe access and egress in place for working at heights.

Loading and unloading of trucks/vehicles – when loading/unloading trucks/vehicles, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 86%
  • No 14%

When observed the process of loading and unloading of trucks/vehicles was mainly found to be compliant in many workplaces across NSW.

Excavations – when working near excavations, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 68%
  • No 32%

Formwork – when working on formwork, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 63%
  • No 37%

When working near excavations there continues to a risk of falls and on formwork inspectors found over a third of the risk of falls was not adequately controlled.

Silos – when working with silos, is the risk of falls from heights being adequately controlled?

  • Yes 44%
  • No 56%

Over half of the Silos inspected did have the correct controls in place to manage the risk of falls.  This insight, however, is from a sample size of silo inspections which was significantly lower than other observation made throughout the project therefore a definitive conclusion on working at height safety when working on silos cannot be accurately assessed when compared to other questions in the checklist.

Disclaimer:  Please note this is aggregated data from the checklist responses and some of the specific falls from heights hazards identified only represent a comparatively small sample size to other questions within in this sector.  This may lead to an incorrect interpretation of the percentages.

Conclusion

Whilst the awareness-raising campaign for work at heights safety succeeded in reaching NSW workers and businesses, it is clear from inspector on-site observations, that unsafe working at heights practices continue to occur at an unacceptable level across NSW workplaces.

Your employer must consult with you about identifying the hazards and controlling the risks whilst putting safety controls in place to stop you or your workmates from getting hurt.

SafeWork NSW will continue to address work at heights risks, and work with industry to increase awareness, provide education, and secure the safety for all workers in NSW workplaces.

Key industry information and resources

General resources

Resources for workers experiencing a Falls from Heights injury

Construction Industry resources

Codes of practice

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