Health and safety: teaching law, educating for prevention

Abstract

Purpose – Teaching health and safety law to non‐lawyers can involve an unreceptive audience. The author works with prospective rural practice surveyors involved with the two highest risk working environments in the UK: construction and agriculture. Unlike construction, the agricultural industry has failed to reduce annual fatalities in the past quarter century and continues to account for around 20 percent of workplace deaths, whilst employing under two percent of the workforce. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effectiveness of teaching methods on both substantive learning and student attitudes.Design/methodology/approach – The methodology used is an iterative process of action research. The paper is introductory, reporting teaching approach and outline findings. Further data will be collected over forthcoming academic periods. The paper explores the use of court cases, as an introduction to studies, to pique student interest, enhance legal skills and, importantly, to attempt to influence beha...