Stockport firm in court after employee severs fingers

Date:

6 July 2012

A Stockport engineering firm has been prosecuted after one of its employees lost four fingers on his left hand when they were crushed in machinery.

The machine which caused the worker's injuries

The 62-year-old from Whaley Bridge in Derbyshire, who has asked not to be named, had been using a power press to cut electrical components from a thin strip of steel when his hand became caught between the unguarded cutting tools.

An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found the machine guards had been disconnected and tied back several days before the incident to allow easy access. This meant that operators could put their hands under the tools to remove components without the power first being cut.

The injured worker's employer, Hayles Pressings Ltd, admitted three health and safety offences when it appeared before Trafford Magistrates' Court following the incident at its factory on Mottram Street in Stockport on 24 November 2010.

The court was told the most likely explanation for the worker's injuries is that he accidently leant on the foot pedal which operated the press while his hand was under the cutting tools. He lost all of the fingers on his left hand including the knuckles and, despite several operations and skin grafts, still has very little use of his hand.

Hayles Pressings Ltd pleaded guilty to three breaches of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 by not providing adequate training to employees, not checking guards were in place, and not preventing access to dangerous parts of the machine.

The company, of Market Street in Hyde, was fined £2,500 and ordered to pay £2,500 towards the cost of the prosecution on 6 July 2012.

Speaking after the hearing, HSE Inspector Jayn Johnson said:

"One of Hayles Pressing's employees has suffered a life-long injury because the company didn't do enough to look after his safety.

"He was not given any formal training on how to use the machine, and the firm ignored its legal duty to carry out daily checks to make sure the guards were in place.

"If it had allowed the machine to be used as it had been designed, with the guards in place, then the worker's injuries could have been avoided. Instead he has lost all four fingers on his left hand."

The Hayles Pressings employee was one of 3,806 workers in the manufacturing industry to suffer a major injury while at work in Great Britain in 2010/11. Another 27 workers lost their lives.

Information on how to improve safety in the manufacturing sector is available at www.hse.gov.uk/manufacturing.

Notes to editors

1. 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. www.hse.gov.uk
2. Regulation 9(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 states: "Every employer shall ensure that all persons who use work equipment have received adequate training for purposes of health and safety, including training in the methods which may be adopted when using the work equipment, any risks which such use may entail and precautions to be taken."
3. Regulation 11(1) states: "Every employer shall ensure that measures are taken...which are effective to prevent access to any dangerous part of machinery or to any rotating stock-bar, or to stop the movement of any dangerous part of machinery or rotating stock-bar before any part of a person enters a danger zone."
4. Regulation 33(1)(a) states: "Every employer shall ensure that a power press is not used after the setting, re-setting or adjustment of its tools, save in trying out its tools or save in die proving, unless its every guard and protection device has been inspected and tested while in position on the power press..."

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Issued on behalf of the Health and Safety Executive by the Regional News Network