Farm safety is often talked about in terms of statistics, compliance and risk assessments. But behind every incident is a life changed in an instant – and the everyday decisions that might have prevented it. CPM explores how one contractor’s story is helping drive a more urgent conversation around safety.
“It’s really easy to get blasé about farm safety.” JILL HEWITT
By Charlotte Cunningham
Cast your mind back to January and the halls of LAMMA were as busy as ever – packed with fresh kit, future-focused thinking and the steady hum of an industry always looking ahead. But tucked away in the Contractors’ Lounge was a display that asked visitors to stop.
Two pallets, 28 caps. No moving parts. No polished metal. No sales message.
Each cap represented a life lost in farming since April 2025 – one individual, one family devastated, one absence that will never be filled, and a number which has sadly since increased. For all the attention often given to output, efficiency and innovation, the display offered something quieter and far harder to ignore: perspective.
Visitors paused, conversations softened and some stood for longer than expected; counting, reflecting and absorbing the scale of what sat in front of them.
HUMANISATION
Organised by the National Association of Agricultural Contractors (NAAC), the memorial was intended not to sensationalise, but to humanise figures that risk becoming too familiar. Because for all the talk of improvement, farming remains one of the most hazardous industries in the UK – and too many incidents are still preventable.
“It’s really easy to get blasé about farm safety,” says NAAC chief executive Jill Hewitt, who is also a member of the Farm Safety Partnership. “We have to keep drawing people’s attention to it.”
That challenge sits at the heart of the issue; the sector knows the risks and it understands the pressure points. In fact, if you ask most people on farm how to work safely and they’ll be able to tell you.
But knowing and doing aren’t always the same thing, and when corners are cut in an industry built around heavy machinery, long hours and changing conditions, the consequences can be immediate and irreversible.
Few people understand that more clearly than Lincolnshire contractor James Bannister. Based near Gainsborough, James runs JLR Farm Services and today undertakes a mix of work, with spraying and manure spreading among the main enterprises. But his involvement in farm safety didn’t begin in a meeting room or on a campaign board – it began in a potato field in August 1998.
At the time, he was working on a farm where lifting potatoes was routine and he says the day itself gave no warning. “6 August 1998 – a normal day. Go to work in the morning, meet up with everybody, discuss what we’re doing for the day,” he recalls. “Nothing out of the ordinary. Just go to work as normal.”
By mid-morning he was cleaning the machine out – something he’d done countless times before. Then, in his words: “Something just happened that day – I still don’t know what – and it actually collared me, pulled me in”.
IN THE MOMENT
James says his last clear recollection was speaking to the trailer driver. After that came fragmented memories – fighting the machine, realising he was inside it, and understanding with terrifying speed just how serious the situation had become. His arm had been dragged through the rollers of the potato harvester and he was trapped.
Thankfully, the trailer driver was nearby and managed to stop the machine, but releasing James was anything but straightforward. He remained trapped for around two-and-a-half hours while emergency services worked to free him. Throughout that time, he was conscious for much of what was happening around him, and remarkably, was able to tell rescuers how parts of the machine could be removed.
“They’d no idea what they were doing,” he says plainly, referring to the mechanics of dismantling the harvester. “So I was telling them what to take off, in what order, so they could get me out.”
Eventually released, James was airlifted to Sheffield Northern General Hospital where he signed his own consent form for the amputation of his left arm. He underwent five hours of surgery that afternoon, followed by further surgery two days later. Within 10 days of the accident, he was back home.
It’s a stark account, but not one James tells for effect. If anything, what comes through most strongly is the brutal ordinariness of the moment before everything changed. He hadn’t set out to do something obviously reckless – he was doing what had become normal. And that perhaps, is the point…
“I was blasé to safety,” he says. “I’ll openly admit that; but it was also common practice across the farm.”
That admission is uncomfortable, but important because safety is rarely lost in one dramatic act. More often, it erodes over time through familiarity, repetition, and the quiet confidence that comes from doing something the same way for years without consequence. A machine is left running for convenience, a guard isn’t replaced straight away, or a shortcut becomes standard practice. Nothing happens, until one day it does.
HINDSIGHT
Looking back now, James is clear on what should have happened. “I should never have been doing it full stop,” he says. Then, asked what he would do differently, his answer is immediate: “I should have just switched it off.”
He says this is the message he now returns to time and time again when speaking to others about safety. “Whatever you do for any machine, switch it off,” he stresses. “Yes you have GPS on the tractor, and when you switch the machine off it shuts your GPS down so you have to reboot it. But for 30 seconds, two minutes, whatever it takes to reboot, it saves your life.”
The physical consequences of the accident were life changing, but they didn’t end at the farm gate. James had intended to return to work as soon as he was able. Instead, six months later, he says his employer told him he wouldn’t be getting his job back because they didn’t believe he could still do it. However, he proved otherwise, and has continued to do so since.
After a period of upheaval, including legal action and the breakdown of his marriage, James bought a tractor and began building his own contracting business. He says it was a leap made on determination as much as certainty. “The thought was if I can do it, I’ll do it, and if I can’t, we’ll have to see what happens then. But I was determined.”
Over time, he rebuilt. Work started slowly with tractor-and-driver hire, then expanded. There were setbacks along the way, including a period in New Zealand, but eventually he and his now partner Lorraine, established JLR Farm Services. Today he remains active within the NAAC, having served as chairman from 2022 to 2024, and is closely involved in its ongoing safety work.
However, that long road back is part of the story too. While fatalities dominate headlines, life-changing injuries often sit in the background – no less significant, just less visible. James speaks candidly about the toll the accident has had on different parts of his life, and although he describes himself as mentally strong, he’s more recently begun counselling for PTSD which he says has been hugely beneficial.
Even so, the thread running through his story isn’t bitterness – it’s purpose. What he wants to change in the industry is simple: mentality.
“The biggest thing is complacency,” he says. “Stop being complacent. If somebody says something, listen to them, don’t ignore it. Think of your life – it isn’t worth the split second; complacency kills.”
That phrase – the split second – matters because so many of the decisions that lead to incidents are made in moments. The temptation to save a minute, the assumption that it’ll be fine, the belief that it won’t happen to you. “I think I had that mentality as well,” admits James. “It’ll never happen to me – until it did.”
According to Jill, that mindset remains one of the hardest barriers to shift. “A lot of these accidents are avoidable,” she says. “We have to change the culture of safety. It’s not all about spending thousands of pounds on a consultant and providing reams of safety paperwork. Some of that stuff’s important, but what’s really important is to think about keeping everybody safe and just reminding people before they do something, just to think about whether it’s safe.”
For James, the answer doesn’t lie in one campaign or one rule change. It’s in people being willing to challenge what’s become normal – especially those in positions of responsibility.
“It starts at the top – the people at the top should be leading the people at the bottom. If they see unsafe practice, it can be as simple as just going up to them and saying look, you could do it like this. Just talk to people.”
That perhaps is where this conversation has to begin – not in abstract targets or distant policy, but in everyday management, habits and decisions. The next incident is unlikely to arrive announced, it’ll look as James’ day did – entirely ordinary, right up until the moment it isn’t.
Which brings the memory back to those caps at LAMMA. They offered no technical fix and no easy answers, but they did force a pause. Perhaps that pause is exactly what farm safety requires more of – long enough to switch off the machine, replace the guard, put on the helmet, say something when something doesn’t look right. Long enough, in other words, to stop a split second becoming a lifetime.
This article was taken from the latest issue of CPM. Read the article in full here.
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