This week’s £2.8m fine given to Costain and Galliford Try, after a worker lost toes in an accident on a water project, demonstrates how heavy financial penalties have become for construction companies guilty of health and safety failings since the new Sentencing Guidelines came into effect in February 2016.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has provided CM with details of the 12 biggest fines handed out since then.
The prosecutions resulted in almost £15m worth of fines, with Balfour Beatty Utility Solutions topping the list with a fine of £2.6m in May 2016.
1) Balfour Beatty Utility Solutions, May 2016: £2.6m
Subcontractor James Sim, 32, from Barry in south Wales was working in a trench in April 2010 laying ducting for new cable for an offshore windfarm that was being built off the coast by Heysham, Lancashire. The trench collapsed and he was killed. For the full report, click here.
2) Kier Integrated Services, December 2017: £1.8m
Worker Aiden Gallagher was killed in May 2014 during a highway repair job near Lidgate in Suffolk. Kier Integrated Services, the principal contractor, pleaded guilty to breaching the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. For the full report, click here.
3) Kier MG, December 2016: £1.5m
Kier MG was one of three contractors fined a total of £2m after Vincent Talbot suffered serious injuries when his leg was crushed when a trench collapsed on him in an incident at Fleet Street, Holbeach, Lincolnshire, on 9 March 2012. For the full report, click here.
4 & 5) Costain and Galliford Try, September 2018, £1.4m each
Costain and Galliford Try Building were together upgrading a water treatment works in Cheshire when a worker’s foot became trapped in a rotating screw during commissioning works. The accident led to the amputation of three of the worker’s toes. For the full report, click here.
6) Tarmac Trading, October 2016: £1.3m
Tarmac Trading was one of two contractors working for Liverpool City Council when a 69-year-old pensioner died and another man was seriously injured while attempting to cross Queens Drive in Liverpool during major resurfacing work in separate incidents during 2012. Tarmac was responsible for the provision and installation of traffic and pedestrian management and pleaded guilt to a breach of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act, 1974. For the full report, click here.
7) Explore Manufacturing, October 2017: £1.3m
Laing O’Rourke subsidiary Explore Manufacturing, which makes concrete panels, was fined £1.3m after employee Richard Reddish was killed. He was working in a MEWP, removing the listing attachments from the top of a concrete panel which weight about 11t. The panel started to topple while he was standing in the raised MEWP. He was thrown from the basket and a panel fell onto him. For the full report, click here.
8) Willmott Partnership Homes, September 2018,: £1.25m
Willmott Dixon’s housing arm Willmott Partnership Homes was fined £1.25m after members of the public were exposed to carbon monoxide at a block of flats it constructed. Aylesbury Crown Court heard how, on 11 December 2014, at Hamilton House in Wolverton, a number of gas installations were found to be either immediately dangerous or at risk following the report of a smell of gas by a householder. For more information, click here.
9) Select Plant Hire, June 2017: £1.2m
Select Plant Hire, another Laing O’Rourke subsidiary was fined £1.2m in relation to the case involving Richard Reddish (above).
10=) Laing O’Rourke Construction, March 2017: £800,000
Laing O’Rourke Construction was fined £800,000 in March 2017 after an October 2014 incident in which Philip Griffiths was killed at Heathrow Airport. Philip’s brother Paul accidentally reversed into his 38-year-old sibling with a dump truck when the pair were trying to move a broken-down scissor lift. For the full report, click here.
10=) Crest Nicholson, September 2016: £800,000
Crest Nicholson pleaded guilty to breaches of the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 after site foreman David Cole, who was working on a large housing development for a brickwork firm, was struck and pulled under by a large bulk powder carrier in December 2014. He suffered life-threatening injuries. For the full report, click here.
10=) Engie Regeneration (Apollo), January 2018: £800,000
Engie Regeneration (Apollo) was one of two firms to be fined after a tenant suffered serious injuries falling through a fragile surface at the Du Cane Estate in Hammersmith and Fulham in June 2015. For the full report, click here.
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