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Lancashire building firm in court over poor working conditions

A Lancashire building firm has been fined for failing to provide basic facilities for its workers for nearly three weeks.

Two Brooks Valley Ltd was prosecuted by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) after an inspection of a construction site for a new mini-supermarket in Warton found workers had no shelter, no way of drying their clothes and no way of heating food and drinks.

Blackpool Magistrates’ Court heard an inspector from HSE had visited the site on Lytham Road on 11 October 2013 and found the only facilities available for the four workers were a chemical toilet and an outside cold-water tap.

Two Brooks Valley Ltd, of East Beach in Lytham, was fined £650 and ordered to pay prosecution costs of £1,050 after pleading guilty to breaching the Construction (Design and Management) Regulations 2007 on 26 March 2014.

Speaking after the hearing, HSE Inspector Allen Shute said: “The four builders were expected to work in cold and wet conditions for nearly three weeks without basic welfare facilities being provided by Two Brooks Valley.

“The working conditions fell well below the minimum legal standards and are no longer tolerated in the 21st century. The company should have made sure suitable facilities, such as a cabin and access to hot water, were on the site before it allowed the building work to start.

“Instead, workers had to face needlessly unpleasant conditions over several weeks and this would have continued if we hadn’t carried out a routine inspection of the site.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Simon Malia .