Author: Fran Burrows
A small business , Duncan Plumbing heating & Electrics of Tockwith has been fined £32,000 and ordered to pay £2,424.60 in costs after one of its
workers was injured at work while installing a flue for a heating system.
The Incident
HSE Fatality and Injuries at Work Stats. 2016/2017
He fell 2m from a roof sustaining various injuries including a broken ankle.
Following the incident, HSE inspectors conducted an investigation and found that the business hadn’t fully planned the installation, which required working at height, and had failed to provide the worker with the necessary equipment to carry out the job, such as a mobile work platform, crawl board and scaffolding. Instead, the worker had been using a ladder to install the flue. This practice amounted to a serious breath of the Health and Safety at Work 1974.
The lesson for any business here is that any work your employees carry out must be properly planned and risk assessed. You are legally required to provide them with the appropriate equipment.
Click here to see our training courses on working at height.