The safe use of vehicles for work

摘要

In this feature, we look at five prosecutions arising from incidents in which vehicles struck five workers, killing three and seriously injuring two more. Four of the cases involved failures to assess the risks and implement safe systems of work in which pedestrians are segregated from vehicles. The other incident was caused by inadequate vehicle maintenance. Two of the incidents also involved training failures. The five cases resulted in fines totalling ￡4.238 million for six companies and a suspended prison sentence for a director. Of the six companies, four had annual turnovers of more than ￡100 million. All of the cases could have been easily avoided if the employers had followed freely available HSE guidance. In our first case, a waste management company was fined ￡1.5 million and ordered to pay costs of ￡475,000 for failures that caused the death of one of its drivers. The fine is four times greater than most recent pre-tax profit made by the company, F&R Cawley. The incident occurred on Saturday 11 October 2014 while Peter Coleman was operating a 16-tonne waste collection vehicle in a refuse area at Woodside Leisure Complex in Watford. He applied the handbrake and left the vehicle to pick up some rubbish. The vehicle began to roll away down an embankment and Mr Coleman, who was working alone, ran after it in an attempt to stop it. He fell underneath the rear of the vehicle and died in hospital from his injuries. He was aged 54.