Gloucestershire quarry fined after stone crushes worker's leg

Date:

14 January 2011

A Moreton-in-Marsh quarry owner was prosecuted today after blocks of stone fell onto a worker, breaking his leg.

Ian Stanley Bond, owner of Stanley's Quarry, was prosecuted by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) after Nicholas Enston, 47, from Bidford on Avon, Warwickshire, was injured while removing scants - pieces of stone pre-cut into a block - at the quarry, on 22 July 2009.

Mr Enston was manually removing each piece, using a forklift truck to transport them. However, the stones were not properly stabilised and as he was working on the block, a number of scants broke free and fell onto his lower body, breaking his left leg in two places.

Gloucester Magistrates' Court heard how Mr Enston was working alone and was unable to call for help. He had to use a nearby hammer to move a lever on the forklift truck and use the forks to lift the scants off his body. He then managed to lift himself up to the cab of the truck and sound the horn.

The HSE investigation found the stones had not been secured properly and that Mr Enston should not have been working alone when carrying out this type of work.

His line manager had not received any appropriate health and safety training and had failed to carry out a risk assessment or put a system in place for working safely with scants, including a system for securing them properly.

HSE inspector, Cath Pickett, said:

"As the owner of Stanley's Quarry, Mr Bond should have made sure everyone at the quarry could do their job safely. Because he failed to do this, Mr Enston ended up sustaining serious injuries in an incident that need not have happened.

"Mr Enston is still off work some 18 months after the incident, which has significantly impacted on his life."

Ian Stanley Bond, owner of Stanley's Quarry, of Upton Wold, Moreton-in-Marsh, admitted breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. He was ordered to pay a fine of £5,000 plus £8,790 in costs.

Notes to editors

1. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is Britain's national regulator for workplace health and safety. It aims to reduce 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. www.hse.gov.uk
2. Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 states that It shall be the duty of every employer to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of all his employees.
3. Regulation 3 of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, states that, "Every employer shall make a suitable and sufficient assessment of:
   • the risks to the health and safety of his employees to which they are exposed whilst they are at work; and
   • the risks to the health and safety of persons not in his employment arising out of or in connection with the conduct by him of his undertaking,
   for the purpose of identifying the measures he needs to take to comply with the requirements and prohibitions imposed upon him by or under the relevant statutory provisions."

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Issued on behalf of the Health and Safety Executive by COI News and PR (South West)