A property management company has been fined and its director given a suspended sentence after a teenage apprentice was killed while working on a property in North Wales.
Chloe Bidwell, 18, was working as an apprentice joiner for Varcity Living at the residential site in Bangor on 20 December 2023. She died after a stack of wooden board material fell on her.
The company pleaded guilty to breaching two sections of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and was fined £50,000 and ordered to pay £10,080 in costs at Llandudno Magistrates’ Court last week.
David Horrocks, of Felinheli, pleaded guilty to another section of the Act and was sentenced to 26 weeks’ imprisonment, suspended for two years and ordered to pay £7,886 in costs.
Bidwell was working alone at the time of the incident – it is believed she was trying to retrieve a plywood board from stack of 28 that were left unsecured against a wall. Some of the boards fell on her, crushing her neck and causing fatal injuries.
No attempt to secure boards
An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that no attempt had been made to secure the boards in their upright position, and the risk of them falling had not been identified.
The HSE probe found that Varcity Living failed to provide safe systems of work and to provide adequate information, instruction, training and supervision, so far as was reasonably practicable.
Bidwell’s mother, Clare Stephenson-Brown, speaking on behalf of the family, described her daughter as “full of life, energy, and determination” and that the fact she died alone “causes us unbearable pain and something we will carry forever”.
She added: “We urge employers to look beyond compliance and truly consider the responsibility they hold for the lives in their care. Safety must be meaningful in practice, ensuring risks are properly managed, lone working is safe, and that everyone who goes to work returns home.”
