Businesses urged to take proper precautions after worker suffers serious back injuries in fall

Date:

13 May 2010

Release No:

YH/161/10

Businesses are being urged to take proper precautions when their staff work at height after a West Yorkshire worker sustained serious back injuries when he plunged more than three metres from a terrace retaining wall on a construction site.

There were no guardrails in place to prevent Graham Parkin falling from height as he accessed a work area. He suffered a fractured vertebrae and has been left with long-term disability problems as a result.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) today (13 May) successfully prosecuted Illson (Builders & Contractors) Ltd, of North Parade, Burley in Wharfedale, for a breach of the Work at Height Regulations 2005 over the incident, which occurred at the Corn Mill in Burley on 19 November 2008. The company was acting as principal contractor on the construction site.

Illson also pleaded guilty to a charge under the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 for failing to notify HSE that construction work was due to take place on site.

Kendal Varley Ltd, Mr Parkin's employer, also pleaded guilty to the same CDM Regs charge.

Bradford Magistrates Court heard that because both companies were the clients for the work, they should have appointed a Construction Design and Management co-ordinator (CDMc) to notify HSE of the construction work. Their failure to do so led to the responsibility for non-notification reverting to them.

Illson (Builders & Contractors) Ltd was fined £5,000 and ordered to pay costs of £1,800 for both offences while Kendall Varley Ltd was given a fine of £2,000 and costs of £1,800 for the one offence.

After the hearing HSE Inspector David Welsh commented:

"If HSE had been correctly notified that work on the Corn Mill was going to take place, it could have inspected the site and the injury may have been averted. The measures in place at the time - the responsibility of Illson (Builders & Contractors) Ltd - simply did not amount to a safe system of work, and as a result Graham Parkin sustained a serious, long-term, fall from height injury."

Notes to editors

1. Regulation 6(3) of the Work at Height Regulations 2005 states: 'Where work is carried out at height, every employer shall take suitable and sufficient measures to prevent, so far as is reasonably practicable, any person falling a distance liable to cause personal injury.'
2. Regulation 21(1), by virtue of regulation 14(4)(b) of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 states: 'The CDM co-ordinator [or client if CDMc not appointed] shall as soon as is practicable after his appointment ensure that notice is given to the Executive containing such of the particulars specified in Schedule 1 as are available.'
3. The Health and Safety Executive is Britain's national regulator for workplace health and safety. It aims to reduce work-related death, injury and ill health. It does so through research, information and advice; promoting training; new or revised regulations and codes of practice; and working with local authority partners by inspection, investigation and enforcement. More information on health and safety can be found online www.hse.gov.uk

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