Waste management company fined after worker's leg amputation.

A London waste management company has been fined for breaching safety legislation after an agency worker had part of a leg amputated after being struck by a moving excavator.

Westminster Magistrates’ Court heard that on 12 September 2017, the worker, employed by Peter Norris (Haulage) Ltd, was observing a tipping activity in the blind spot of the excavator, when his leg was crushed by the machine that had reversed to accommodate another vehicle tipping off waste in an adjacent part of the site.

A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation found no evidence of any system at the business in which new agency-hired staff were shown the site’s safety rules.

This mean that the injured worker was unaware he was to stand in the safe refuge areas whilst vehicles were moving around the site.

Peter Norris (Haulage) Ltd of Tower Bridge House, St Katharine’s Way, London, admitted to a breach of Section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. The company was fined £140,000 and ordered to pay full costs of £9,322.48.

After the hearing, HSE inspector, John Spence, said: “This incident was entirely preventable and has caused a permanent and life-changing injury to a young agency worker.

“The company failed to implement an adequate system of monitoring agency workers on site who were therefore, in effect, left to manage themselves without necessary oversight from the company.

“Any company that uses agency workers is required to extend the same duty of care to them as to its own employees.”