Workers memorial day takes place on the 28th April every year. It began in Canada in 1984 and is now an international day of remembrance and action for workers killed, disabled, injured or made unwell by their work. Unfortunately it has never been more relevant or needed despite the media and their emphasis on the supposed compensation culture and ‘Elf and safety’ gone mad.
The HSE’s own figures for the period April to September 2009 show that during this period alone 122 people went to work and never came back. The tales told by the statistics and the responses of the companies involved are depressingly familiar.
In just the first few months of 2010 for example Companies have been fined for serious breaches of health and safety at work:
Aviance UK Ltd were fined £90,000 and £18,800 in costs after failing to carry out maintenance checks on a defective vehicle that collapsed on an engineer during an inspection. His death could have been avoided had just £30 had been spent on a pair of axle stands which could have been carried in the company maintenance van. Aviance employ over 21,000.
Frank Bruce and Company Ltd, which rents out industrial premises, were fined £18000. They had contracted two construction firms to replace and repaint roofs at Lawrence Hill Industrial Park between Feb and Mar 2009. Whilst they were aware that asbestos was present in the roof insulation of the building no safety precautions were put in place prior to the work starting and so the building became contaminated with asbestos dust, to which seven workers were exposed. It will not be known for some time whether the exposed workers will contract a fatal disease from this exposure.
2010 Veolia ES (UK) Ltd, was fined £130,000 and costs of £220,000 when a garbage collector, David Ives, was killed when an 1100 litre recycling bin came loose from the bin hoist on the recycling lorry and fell onto him. Had the bin hoist on the recycling lorry had been maintained the incident would never have happened.
Royal Mail Group Ltd, based at 148 Old Street, London, was ordered to pay £90,000 when Yard shunter Colin Smith, 57, was fatally injured as he attempted to remove the connecting lock between a lorry cab and its trailer Royal Mail, acknowledged their failings and since the accident they have put measures in place to prevent a recurrence.
The familiar refrain after each of these tragic episodes is to hear both of the Company’s regret that a system failure occurred and then to hear from the Inspector from the HSE of how the death was, with more thought, easily preventable.
Definitive guidelines were published in November 2009 to help courts deal with organisations that cause death through a gross breach of care, or where a health and safety offence is a significant cause of a death. Organisations guilty of corporate manslaughter can be given up to a seven-figure fine, which should only be less than £500,000 in rare cases, states the Sentencing Guidelines Council. For other health and safety offences that result in death, convicted companies can expect a six-figure penalty.
The level of penalty is not to be linked to company turnover or profit which I believe is a mistake. The Independent Sentencing Advisory Panel had proposed a fixed range of percentages based on annual turnover but this was not implemented.
Many larger Companies do not feel the pain of fines of this size and merely plead guilty to the offence. The best deterrent available under the guidelines would seem to be that the Court can order that the defendant company publicises its conviction. It is to be hoped that this will be widely used. However, it would be good to see punitive or exemplary damages in Civil Cases involving serious breaches of Health and safety.
Promoting Workers Memorial day is one way of remembering those died and fighting to improve conditions for the living .
Please see site : http://www.tuc.org.uk/h_and_s/tuc-11563-f0.cfm#what for details of the National events going on that you could get involved in.
Submitted by Marcus Weatherby
