Offences and penalties report - Lawrence Atkinson

The summary

In February 2003 the Health and Safety Executive investigated a fatal fall from a scaffold at a steel works in North-East England. The deceased, 44-year-old Lawrence Atkinson, a scaffolder employed by a contractor, fell ten metres from a cantilevered scaffold into a hot metal pit. A second scaffolder was injured in the incident. The men were erecting access scaffold to provide a working platform from which to make repairs to a large iron transfer ladle. The team decided to erect cantilevered scaffolding that overhung the pit, even though this could have been avoided. The contractor had previously been prosecuted following a non-fatal fall from scaffolding. Despite previous HSE advice there were no site-specific risk assessments and this failure to follow advice was taken into account by the court as an aggravating factor in this case.

The personal cost

It was a normal day in the lives of Lawrence Atkinson, his wife Janet and their two children Laura, 18 and Jordan 12. Lawrence had left for work as usual that morning. He had taken the family car so that he could pick up his younger daughter, Jordan, from school and take her to the orthodontist. Janet Atkinson went off to her job as a legal secretary.

At 3 30 p.m. that afternoon Mrs. Atkinson received a telephone call from her husband’s workplace to tell her that he had had an accident. She arranged for Laura to meet Jordan from school and made her way home. “I kept ringing my husband’s workplace to try and find out what had happened but could not get any information. By half past five I was hysterical. My worst fears were confirmed when a police officer came to the door. My family came round and we went to the hospital. My husband was dead. He was only 44 years old.”

“I was numb with shock. I tried not to think about the terrible way in which he died. He simply did not stand a chance. He had worked for the company for eight years and he often came home with stories of near accidents. He knew the job was dangerous. Because of the nature of the work the company should have ensured that every safeguard had been taken. On that day it can’t have been. My husband was a kind, loving, well-liked family man. A man’s man. He had many friends, a good sense of humour and always had a funny story to tell. We were soul mates and had been for nearly 20 years. One of the worst things to face was my own personal loneliness as the children involved themselves with friends and lots of activity as a buffer against the grief. It was difficult to find a reason to get up in the morning. The first year after his death was a blur. I had to go on to part time work so that Jordan did not have to come to an empty house. She had been very traumatised because her dad had been due to meet her from school on the day that he died. My elder daughter, Laura, now 21, is still having counselling to help her get over her dad’s death. ”

The penalty

The company that employed Lawrence was prosecuted under section 2 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 at Guisborough Magistrates’ Court. The company was fined £18,000 and ordered to pay costs of £4,436.