Fine for company following injury of untrained worker

Meldrum Construction Services has been fined £4,500 and ordered to pay £2,342 in costs following an incident where a fork lift truck being driven by an untrained operative overturned.

Tom Lincoln was working for Meldrum Construction on their site in Sandhoe in Northumberland. Mr Lincoln was operating the fork lift to move roof trusses onto the roof of a new building which were being held on a strap. In order to manoeuvre the fork lift down without the strap getting caught the boom of the fork lift had to be extended. However, as the fork lift was parked on an incline this caused the fork lift to overturn throwing Mr Lincoln onto his right arm.

Mr Lincoln had not been trained to drive the fork lift and was not wearing a seatbelt and sustained serious injuries to his arm which meant he has not returned to work since the accident on 16 July 2008. It was also found that while the company had produced a risk assessment and a system of work for lifting the roof trusses, neither were sufficient, nor had failed to identify the dangers that workers would face.

The company appeared at Tynedale Magistrates’ Court in Hexham, on 7 January, and pleaded guilty to breaching s2(1) of the HSWA 1974.