Offences this month:
Worker loses finger due to health and safety failures
Whilst working on a machine, an employee welder at Lander Automotive Limited, Birmingham, got his glove entangled in the drill part of the machine. He suffered partial amputation to the third finger on his right hand.
Breach
Lander Automotive Limited, of Clapgate Lane, Birmingham, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974.
Section 3(1) states it shall be the duty of every employer to conduct his undertaking in such a way as to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, that persons not in his employment who may be affected thereby are not thereby exposed to risks to their health or safety.
Penalty
The company was fined £27,000 and ordered to pay costs of £1,574 and a £120 victim surcharge.
Solar panel specialists in court for roof light fall failings
A worker fractured his shin and a vertebra when he fell through a roof light of outbuilding housing a swimming pool at Elvington Lane in Hawkinge on 30 April 2013. The workers fall was partially cushioned by the swimming pool water, although there was a heavy impact with the side and flooring around the pool, and was unable to return to work until January this year and only then on a part-time basis.
P V Solar UK Limited, of Cambuslang Road, Glasgow, pleaded guilty to three separate breaches of the Work at Height Regulations 2005.
The company fined a total of £153,000 and ordered to pay a further £29,480 in costs
Chemical company fined £200,000 following toxic chemical release
A company maintenance technician unintentionally opened a valve on top of an isotanker at Syngenta Ltd’s Huddersfield plant, ejecting, under pressure, between 3.5 and 3.8 tonnes of the very toxic chemical, paraquat dichloride solution.
Syngenta Ltd of Leeds Road Huddersfield pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 4 of the Control Of Major Accident Hazards Regulations 1999 and Regulation 5(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998
The company was fined £200,000 with £13,041 in costs.
