Cleaning firm fall fine
Lincoln College has been fined £1,500 after a window cleaner fell four metres in an accident in November 2008, suffering broken ribs and a serious back injury. It was also ordered to pay £9,500 costs. The cleaning firm, A Nicoll & Son, was prosecuted in October 2009 when it was fined £2,500 and ordered to pay costs of £2,948 over the incident.
Manufacturer prosecuted
A firm that caused a worker to break his leg in several places after 700kg of steel fell on him has been fined £8,000. Dranson, a manufacturer based in Bushbury, Wolverhampton, was prosecuted following a Health and Safety Executive investigation over the incident in November 2009, and admitted breaches of health and safety regulations. It was also ordered to pay £3,603 in costs.
Woodworking website
A redesigned website for staff in the woodworking sector has been launched by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE). The woodworking industry is one of the most dangerous in the manufacturing sector, with more than 300 people suffering major injuries last year, and 1,100 off work for more than three days, said the HSE. The website – www.hse.gov.uk/woodworking – aims to make it easier for workers, supervisors and managers to fully understand the risks they may face and learn how to deal with them, it added.
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Steel group fined
Two companies and a managing director have been fined a total of £170,000 after a 23-year-old worker from Kettering fell more than nine metres, leaving him paralysed from the chest down. The Health and Safety Executive prosecuted SDI Group UK of Cambridge, Steel Construction of Coventry and Richard Berwick, managing director of RM Berwick Steel Erection Services, Isham, Northamptonshire, after the incident in February 2007.
