Michael Macdonald, Prospect negotiations officer responsible for the HSE, said: "The committee highlights the vital role of inspectors and the need to coordinate other HSE activity around effective inspection. It successfully identified the correlation between inspection and improvements in health and safety performance."

However HSE inspector and Prospect branch chair Neil Hope-Collins added: "If our members are to reduce the current unacceptable level of death and injury at work then they need to be out and about in enough numbers to make an impact.

"We welcome the call for additional resources to be directed at construction and off-shore sectors; this work is highly skilled and there simply are not enough inspectors to tackle the hazards workers face in these industries."

While applauding the call for more resources for occupational health interventions, Prospect remains unconvinced that moving occupational health out of the HSE would be successful.

The union will be urging ministers to act on the findings. Macdonald said: "Unfortunately the government ignored large chunks of the last select committee report, in particular the criticisms of HSE’s resources.

"We hope that James Purnell and Lord Bill McKenzie, as the responsible ministers, take a more constructive view of these latest findings and work with key stakeholders to respond to its recommendations. Workers’ safety is so vital that it deserves a well-reasoned response from government, rather than just filing it in the too-difficult-to-do box."

Prospect took the lead in trade union submissions to the inquiry, making two written submissions and presenting oral evidence.

HSE funding has dropped dramatically as a proportion of government spending over the past 20 years and is planned to drop further over the next three years as total spending is frozen at current levels and eroded by inflation.