Suez Fined After Worker Injured On Site

Suez Recycling and Recovery has been fined after a worker suffered from a back injury after manually moving gantry steps.

Preston Crown Court heard how on, 10 September 2016, an employee of Suez Recycling and Recovery Limited helped to manually move steps weighting in excess of 950kg at a site in Duckworth Clough, Haslingden, after repair works had taken place.

As a result of this work, the employee sustained a back injury.

An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found manually moving and realigning steps was a regular occurrence and that employees would use a scaffold pole under the steps to move them back into position.

HSE inspector Sharon Butler – “If a suitable safe system of work had been in place prior to the incident, the injuries sustained by the employee could have been prevented.”

The HSE said senior staff knew how the steps were moved and that employees had concerns, as it had been reported, yet no suitable assessment had been carried out, or safe system of work implemented, to avoid hazardous handling.

No equipment or handling aids had been considered to help employees manoeuvre the gantry steps, it said.

Suez Recycling and Recovery Limited of Grenfell Road, Maidenhead, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2 (1) of the Health and Safety and Work Act 1974 and has been fined £144,000 and ordered to pay costs of £32,000.

Speaking after the hearing, HSE inspector Sharon Butler said: “Incorrect manual handling is one of the most common causes of injury at work.

“Those in control of work have a responsibility to devise safe methods of working and to provide the necessary equipment, information, instruction and training to their workers.

“If a suitable safe system of work had been in place prior to the incident, the injuries sustained by the employee could have been prevented.”

A SUEZ recycling and recovery UK spokesperson said: “At SUEZ, we put the safety of our employees, and the public we serve, at the centre of everything we do. We have invested significantly in our health and safety management systems over the past decade and created a successful, long-running, ‘Safety in Mind’ programme, which helps us to continually improve our health and safety performance.

“Unfortunately, on this occasion, we have fallen short of our own high standards and this resulted in an injury to an employee although, thankfully, the employee has since recovered. We have learned from this incident and, although SUEZ no longer operates the specific site in question, have reviewed our procedures across the business to ensure similar incidents do not occur elsewhere.”