Milking firm in court after worker injured at Derbyshire farm

Date:

30 August 2012

Release No:

HSE/M/117/12

A Shropshire milking company has been fined after a worker suffered a fractured skull when he was hit by a steel beam at a Derbyshire farm just a day after he started his job.

The employee, 49, from Preston, was asked to help an experienced engineer install a milking parlour at Brookley Meadows Farm, Thurvaston, Derbyshire, on 5 July 2011, his second day at work for United Milking Systems Ltd.

Derby Magistrates were told today (30 August) that part of the work involved installing four 80kg steel beams at a height of around two metres. The two men tried to install one of them by having one person hold it over his head while the second climbed a stepladder, took the beam from the first person and placed it on to a wall bracket.

The engineer had rested one end of the beam on the wall bracket and they were lifting it on to the opposite bracket when it slipped. As one end hit the floor the vibration caused the engineer on the stepladder to lose his grip on the beam and it landed on the new employee's head.

He suffered a fractured skull and lacerations and was off work for six weeks.

An investigation into the incident by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found it could have been prevented had the company used suitable lifting equipment.

United Milking Systems Ltd, of Tern Hill, Market Drayton, Shropshire, admitted breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and was fined £7,500 and ordered to pay costs of £5,000.

After the hearing HSE inspector Edward Walker said:

"This was an incident waiting to happen owing to a series of failures by United Milking Systems. The company failed to plan the work properly and failed to assess the risks associated with the task, such as manual handling or falling objects.

"As a consequence, they didn't take any steps to reduce the risks through providing appropriate equipment and training. As a result a worker who was only on his second day with the firm suffered a painful head injury that left him unable to work for six weeks."

For information about manual handling and lifting go to http://www.hse.gov.uk/guidance/index.htm

Notes to editors

1. The Health and Safety Executive 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. 2. Section 2 (1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 states: "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. HSE information and news releases can be accessed at: www.hse.gov.uk/press

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