SAPA Profiles UK fine highlights need for safety measures at work

Gas detection equipment can be purchased such as the BW GasAlert Max XT II

Companies could face fines if they fail to provide the relevant safety equipment and training - a fact highlighted in a recent court case involving a Derbyshire aluminium profile maker.

Managers and business owner have a responsibility to provide relevant safety equipment and training to all staff working in potentially dangerous environments.

Those who fail to adhere to regulations laid down by health and safety organisations could face fines and even criminal convictions should they be prosecuted.

One Derbyshire firm recently found this out the hard way after it was fined tens of thousands of pounds for failings related to working in confined spaces.

The Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999 state that employers and self-employed people should carry out a suitable risk assessment when anyone is working in a potentially dangerous situation.

"For work in confined spaces this means identifying the hazards present, assessing the risks and determining what precautions to take," the regulations say.

However, aluminium profile maker SAPA Profiles UK was last month forced to pay £30,000 in fines and £12,348 in costs after pleading guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 for failing to protect its workforce.

The firm had previously been asked to provide training and a safe system of work for its employees entering a 5.5 metre deep pit to retrieve waste aluminium.

While it did draw up a safe system of work and train some of its staff, others were given no training.

Furthermore, the firm's gas detection equipment was not properly calibrated and therefore not accurate, while harnesses used to access the pit were not thoroughly examined in spite of a reminder from the company's insurer.

It is highly important to make sure gas detection equipment is properly calibrated and serviced.  Frontline Safety can provide the calibration and maintenance of gas detection instruments - visit our website to find more information.

Health and Safety Executive inspector Scott Wynne explained that this meant staff were regularly put in danger unnecessarily.

"Every time someone went into the pit, a permit to work had to be completed giving details of how the work was to be carried out. Of 147 permits examined, 97 had clear issues yet those issues were never identified or followed up," he said.

"Conditions in the pit are very unpleasant. It is a hot, humid, dark, confined space where people could easily have become disorientated or overcome by the heat. There was a significant risk to workers from oxygen deficiency and from other substances entering the pit."

The BW GasAlert Max XT II is a multi-gas monitor from BW Technologies which would have been suitable for the company to use in this situation.  For more information on this product, visit the multi-gas detection section of the Frontline Safety website.

Mr Wynne added that the company had failed to ensure its written procedures were being followed and that it was only luck that nobody had been seriously harmed in relation to the work in question.

Posted by Shona Innes