Some 15 out of 78 sites checked during the first three weeks of September were told to stop work immediately after being served Prohibition Notices.

They were all due to insufficient precautions put in place for working at height.

According to the HSE, 49 workers lost their lives on construction sites in the UK in the year ending April 2012, with falls from a height the most common cause of these fatalities.

Last month, the Sunday Herald reported that experts were warning thousands of people were being killed or seriously injured because of drastic cuts to funding, staff, inspections and enforcement at the HSE.