Children's playground accidents and personal injury claims
Every year in the UK tens of thousands of children are admitted to accident and emergency with injuries sustained in playground accidents. While a large number of these are attributable to factors such as poor parental supervision, misuse of equipment, inappropriate clothing or adverse weather conditions, others will be attributable to problems with the playgrounds themselves. In these latter cases parents may feel there are issues of negligence that give them grounds for a personal injury claim.
Strong grounds for a personal injury claim may arise when there are issues surrounding the structural integrity of equipment, design of equipment, maintenance and inspection failings, or the suitability of particular play equipment for its target age group.
The majority of playground accidents can be placed in the falls category, 75% in fact. The following is a statistical breakdown taken from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents detailing the types of playground equipment associated with fall injuries:
- Swings - 40% of playground fall injuries
- Climbers - 23% of playground fall injuries
- Slides - 21% of playground fall injuries
- Roundabouts - 5% of playground fall injuries
- See-saws - 4% of playground fall injuries
- Fireman's poles - 1% of playground fall injuries
- Various others - 6% of playground fall injuries
Planners attempt to minimise the risk of fall injuries by restricting the height at which playground equipment can be built to 2.5 metres. Also, where equipment is more than 0.6 metres in height, the ground surrounding it must be made from a substance that has the effect of softening impact in the event of a fall. Standards concerning the safety of surfacing must meet EN 1177, while standards concerning equipment must meet EN 1176.
The main acts of parliament concerning the safety of playgrounds are the Occupier's Liability Act (1957), the Health and Safety at Work Act (1974) and the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations (1999).
These rules and regulations are particularly pertinent to schools, where playground accidents account for more injuries than accidents of any other kind.
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