Keep children safe on farms

Farms are homes as well as workplaces, and children and young people are killed and injured on them every year. They are hurt while working, playing or trespassing. The most common causes of death and major injury are falling from vehicles, being struck by moving vehicles or objects, contact with machinery, driving vehicles, falls from height, and drowning or asphyxiation. Parents are responsible for stopping their children straying into danger. Every adult working on the farm, including employees and contractors, must also take responsibility for child safety.

What the law says

Trailers, cabs and enforcement

HSE's guidance on adequate means of stopping a child falling from a trailer is solid sides, headboards and tailboards at least 920 mm high. Guard rails between 920 mm and 1,070 mm high, with an intermediate rail and a toe board, also meet it. A child is never safe in a cab. Children fall through opening doors and rear windows, and are run over when they get out.

The law does not exempt parents or relatives, and HSE enforces it. The offence is contravening health and safety regulations, which carries up to 2 years in prison, a fine, or both on conviction on indictment.

Machines and quad bikes for older children

They should not drive, operate, help operate, maintain or clean harvesters and processing machines. The same goes for trailers and towed machinery with conveying, loading or spreading mechanisms, and powered cultivators. It also covers any machine with cutting, splitting, grinding or crushing mechanisms, including chainsaws. Chemical applicators of any sort are out, as are ditching and drainage machinery, materials handlers such as skid steer loaders and lift trucks, powered grain or slurry-carrying machinery, and powered feed-preparation equipment. A machine may be cleaned or maintained only if its parts are stationary, isolated and the keys removed.

Children over 13 should ride only ATVs of an appropriate size and power, after formal training on a low-power ATV. Follow the manufacturer's minimum age, which is often 16. Never carry a child as a passenger on an ATV.

Controls that keep children away from danger

Run your risk assessment with children in mind. HSE suggests asking a neighbour or friend to look round the farm with fresh eyes, because you can become blind to risks you see every day. Then put in place the controls that fit your farm.

• Provide a securely fenced play area with enough to keep children busy, and keep children away from farming activities and work traffic.
• Make sure everyone working on the farm knows to stop work and take the child somewhere safe if an unsupervised child appears in the work area.
• Let a child watch you work only if the task is not inherently dangerous, the person doing it is not also supervising the child, and the child is kept in a safe place.
• Use the safe stop procedure whenever you leave a vehicle unattended, avoid blind reversing by using a banksman, and put up signs reminding drivers that children may be nearby.
• Fence lagoons and reservoirs with a child-deterrent fence 1.3 m high, cover pits and sheep dips with grids spaced no more than 65 mm apart, and keep buildings holding silos and grain bins locked.
• Secure ladders and heavy items such as gates and wheels, and stack bales and pallets so children cannot climb them.
• Lock away pesticides, veterinary medicines and other hazardous substances, and never decant them into drinks bottles.
• Never let a child enter a pen or loose housing containing a bull, boar, stallion, ram or stag, or a female animal with newborn young.
• Make sure children wash their hands with soap and water after contact with animals and before they eat or drink, to guard against infections such as E. coli O157.

Visitors, contractors and trespassers

Any child who enters the working part of the farm needs direct supervision. If you host a school party, tell the organisers your safety rules and your no-go areas. A farm that opens only occasionally should treat HSE's leaflet as the minimum. Give contractors clear instructions to stop work and make the area safe if a child enters, and agree with them the working areas and how they will prevent access.

Trespass is a matter for the police, not HSE. If you know children are trespassing, keep fences, gates and warning signs in good repair, tell them to leave, and report persistent offenders to their parents and the police.

Employing young people