Personal injury news roundup: 7 days ended 18 June 2013:
Work accidents will quickly call down the ire of the Health and Safety Executive, but firms have even more to worry about when injury solicitors get involved.
It’s bad luck for any company that ends up not only getting prosecuted by the HSE but are almost guaranteed to face an expensive personal injury compensation claim due to the involvement of one of their employees. In fact, not just one but two instances of serious workplace accidents in the news this week are perfect examples of how the businesses involved are going to have a very rough go of it once the personal injury solicitors get through with them.
The first story is sadly a tragic one, as it involves the death of one 37 year old employed by Adis Scaffolding. David Vickers of West Yorkshire was tragically slain when a truck overturned and crushed him; the HSE inspectors sent out to investigate the incident discovered that a skip that had been in the process of being loaded on the lorry had caused the accident as it had been improperly secured, leading to Adis Scaffolding being dragged into magistrates’ court and prosecuted by the HSE for their role in not following health and Safety guidelines.
The firm was fined an eye-watering £300,000 by the courts; on top of that, there was another £120,000 in legal fees that Adis was ordered to pay. This is of course only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what’s most certainly waiting in the wings: a massive wrongful death lawsuit to be brought by Mr Vickers’ family is almost a forgone conclusion, and is likely to see the company out an even larger sum of money as a result; I can only wonder if Adis Scaffolding is going to end up in administration after all these crippling legal fees.
Of course, you don’t have to end up losing your life to bring an accident claim against your employer – something that one poor bloke that was injured by a pressurised air hose will likely decide once the HSE has finished with his firm. Faltec Europe has ended up in some very hot water recently as well after the HSE found it had neglected to provide enough training to the unnamed man before telling him to clean a paint fume filter with a sprayer that used high-pressure air hoses.
The man had finished his job and was preparing to move on to his next task when he forgot to vent his sprayer’s air hose before disengaging it, resulting in the hose to start whipping about like mad and smashing him in the face. The poor man actually lost his sight in one eye because the hose hit him with such force, and with the HSE investigation determining that he wasn’t given the right training to prevent such incidents, Faltec Europe is set up to be positively raked over the coals by the magistrates’ court and the injured man’s solicitor team eventually as well.