HSE | A construction company and its director have been fined after being found guilty of safety breaches that resulted in a five-year-old child being injured by a falling cast iron pipe.
Sage Homes Limited and its director were convicted for failing to properly assess a foreseeable risk.
The incident occurred on 20 July 2021, during building work on an extension to a house in Totton – a few seconds’ walk from a local primary school. A cast iron pipe fell onto a passing child striking him on the head and fracturing his skull.
The base of the pipe had been broken away by the builder some days before to allow him to excavate into the concrete floor. When a TV cable was freed from the pipe, the top two sections of pipe, weighing over 45kg, fell across the pavement. The cast iron pipe was estimated to date from the 1930s, and both the pipe and the fixings were corroded.
The HSE found that Sage Homes Limited and its director, Jason Scorey, had failed to properly assess what was a foreseeable risk. In giving evidence, Mr Scorey insisted that he could see no need to secure the pipe against the wall.
Sage Homes Limited and Jason Scorey were sentenced for breaches of Section 3(1) and Section 37 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, respectively. Mr Scorey received a fine of £1,685, with 45 days’ imprisonment in default, and was ordered to pay costs of £10,436. Sage Homes Limited was fined £15,000. Both Mr Scorey and Sage Homes Limited were also ordered to pay a victim surcharge.
After the hearing, HSE inspector Alexander Ashen said: “Properly assessing risk to workers and members of the public is a vital part of any construction project.
“It would have been a simple and inexpensive task to secure the pipe once it had been broken out at its base. The fact that the construction work was being carried out yards from a school gate at the time parents were collecting their children should have prompted even more care on the part of the duty holder.
“This case should underline to everyone in the building trade that the courts, and HSE, take a failure to follow the regulations extremely seriously. HSE will not hesitate to take action against companies and their directors which do not do all that they should to keep people safe.”
This HSE prosecution was brought by HSE enforcement lawyer Rebecca Schwartz and paralegal officer, Melissa Wardle.
