Prosecutions

A Manchester fencing manufacturer has admitted putting its employees in danger by allowing them to use unguarded machinery.

The company was prosecuted by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) after it allowed guards to be disabled on nine fence cutting machines at its factory in Trafford Park.

When an HSE inspector visited the site on 23 July 2009, he served nine Prohibition Notices banning the use of the machines and an Improvement Notice requiring changes to working practices.

Trafford Magistrates' Court heard that the guards on five machines had been deliberately bypassed. This meant that workers could gain access them while they were still operating, to carry out maintenance work and remove waste materials.

The investigating inspector from the HSE, said:

"The machines should have automatically shut down before anyone was able to get close to the dangerous parts of the machinery.

"But as a result of the guards being defeated, the machines continued to operate with workers at risk of coming into contact with moving parts and suffering serious injury.

"Missing or defective guards on machinery are a common cause of injury in the manufacturing sector. It is only by chance that no one was seriously injured in this case."

The company pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 11(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998 by failing to prevent access to dangerous parts of machinery and was fined £14,000 and ordered to pay £2,774 towards the cost of the prosecution on 9 October.