Exhall company fined £200,000 after worker’s horror fall from fork-lift truck

An Exhall-based firm has been fined GBP200,000 after a worker’s horror 3.5 metre fall from a forklift truck. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) said the man, who has not been identified, ‘could have been killed’ during the incident at Staircraft Group Limited. On June 14 last year, he was working for the firm at their head office site at Bayton Road Industrial Estate, Exhall when the incident happened.

The employee was working from an unsecured stillage on the forks of a fork-lift truck trying to clean office windows at height. The Health and Safety Executive said that the stillage tipped and the employee fell 3.5 metres to the ground. As a result, he suffered a broken leg and an injury to his elbow.

READ MORE: Popular Bedworth pub closes for huge refurb and expansion As a result of the incident, the HSE launched an investigation and found the company failed to identify that using a stillage to lift someone on the forks of a forklift truck, a method that they had used before, was unsafe. It also found that there was a lack of training for employees on the dangers of working at height without the proper equipment and there were no systems of work or risk assessments in place.

The HSE took legal action and, at Redditch Magistrates’ Court, Staircraft Group Limited pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1974. The firm was fined GBP200,000 and ordered to pay costs of GBP6,477.93. Speaking after the hearing, HSE inspector Rebecca Whiley said: “The employee’s injuries were very serious, and he could have easily been killed.

This serious incident could so easily have been avoided by simply carrying out correct control measures and safe working practices.

“Companies should be aware that HSE will not hesitate to take appropriate enforcement action against those that fall below the required standards.”

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