Skip-hire company prosecuted after driver fatality
MAC Skip Hire fined £60,000 after lorry driver was fatally crushed between two vehicles
MAC Skip Hire Ltd have been fined £60,000 after a lorry driver was fatally crushed between two vehicles at one of the company’s sites in Leicestershire.
Leicester Magistrates’ Court heard how, on 4 November 2015, Beverley Upton, an employee of the company, was crushed between her lorry and the bucket of a loading shovel while it was being loaded.
Ms Upton and the loader driver had been trying to remove some overhanging waste when the incident occurred.
An investigation by the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) found the Tamworth-based company had failed to implement and follow systems and site rules for loading operations at its Leicester Road site, in Hinckley, which resulted in a failure to suitably segregate pedestrians and vehicles.
MAC Skip Hire pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974 and were fined £60,000 and ordered to pay costs of £14,500.
Speaking after the hearing, HSE Inspector Mark Austin said: ‘This was a tragic and wholly avoidable incident, caused by the failure to ensure that basic site controls and rules were being managed and enforced, such that pedestrians were not at risk from these large vehicles working in the area.’
