Firms fined over safety regulations

VALLEY Mills in Delph, when officials from the Health and Safety executive visited

TWO Oldham-based companies have been slapped with a fine after they allowed their roofers to work without any safety equipment to stop them from falling off a building.

Contractors, MKM Fabrications Ltd. and Clad-It Limited, pleaded guilty at Manchester Magistrates' Court to health and safety breaches and were each fined £66,000 with £3,938.38 costs.

MKM Fabrications Ltd, of Meek Street in Royton, had been employed as the principal contractor to carry out a roof replacement on one of the buildings at Valley Mills in Millgate, Delph.

The company subcontracted part of the project, which involved replacing a northern light roof structure with a modern composite roof, to Clad-It Limited ­- of Trent Industrial Estate in Duchess Street, Shaw.

Concerns were raised to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) claiming that men were working on the roof with nothing in place to prevent them falling off the edge or through the roof onto mill workers below.

The subsequent HSE investigation confirmed these hazardous working conditions were in place, with workers from both MKM and Clad-It at risk. Inspectors also established that these working practices continued during snowy weather.

The roof was covered in fragile skylights which had not been covered to prevent any person stepping onto them and falling through, nor were any measures taken to prevent a worker falling through the large gap created after the skylight had been removed. Prohibition Notices were served stopping the works until a safe method could be found and put into place.

As principal contractor for the works, MKM Fabrications had the primary responsibility for the health and safety of workers. MKM failed to effectively plan the safe completion of the project and failed to put in place measures to prevent anyone falling from the unguarded sections of the roof.

As subcontractor for the works Clad-It had a duty to protect its own workers as well as anyone affected by its works. By allowing its employees onto site without a suitable and sufficient planning being in place, or any physical safeguards to prevent a fall from height, the company exposed its own workers to those risks.

HSE inspector Matt Greenly said: "MKM and Clad-It failed in their duties to protect the roof workers and anyone working below them in the mill from a foreseeable risk of serious harm."