Seat belt firm fined £10k for avoidable injury

A Staffordshire company that manufactures webbing for car safety belts from polyester and nylon has been fined a total of more than £10,000 after a worker was seriously injured in an industrial accident.

Marling Leek, based in Leek, admitted breaching the Health and Safety at Work Act during a hearing before Staffordshire magistrates (June 20).

The court heard that in August 2011 employee Stewart Wood, 60, suffered severe burns after he tried to remove webbing that had become stuck around rollers. According to evidence given, the machine had not been first isolated with the result that Wood was dragged into the rollers.

When the Health & Safety Executive (HSE) began to probe the accident they found that employees had not received adequate training on removing wrap arounds.

Following the hearing senior HSE Inspector Lyn Spooner said: "Mr Wood was lucky not to have been more seriously injured or even killed. The rollers pulled both his arms in above his head and trapped him for what can have only been a terrifying number of minutes.

"The consideration given to the risks of operating this machine was not suitable or sufficient, and supervision and monitoring was also inadequate. The picture that emerged of Marling Leek is one that failed to develop an effective safety management system.

"In doing so they exposed their employees over a prolonged period to significant risk every day they came to work, ending in a tragic incident that could and should have been prevented."

The company was fined £5,000 with £5,800 costs.

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