Walsall director given suspended sentence after worker crushed to death

Safi Qais Khan died at Master Construction Products (Skips) in Birmingham after he became entangled in a machine called a trommel, used to sort waste material.

MCPS admitted the corporate manslaughter of Mr Khan, after an investigation found there was no safe system of work for the trommel and it was in a dangerous state.

The Crown Prosecution Service said essential guards to prevent entrapment were missing, there was no emergency stop button on the machine and it was surrounded by uneven and waste strewn ground.

The company also admitted a health and safety breach of a duty owed to its employee in failing to ensure measures were in place to minimise risks of entrapment, crushing or falls whilst working at the trommel.

Jagbir Singh, from Brookmeadow Road, Walsall, director of MCPS, based in Tyseley, pleaded guilty to a health and safety offence.

The court heard he was responsible for Health and Safety on the site and an investigation revealed that he had failed to provide the employee with a safe system of work or with safe equipment to work on. The trommel was described as being in a dilapidated, ramshackle and lethal state with unguarded moving parts and no emergency stops. It was surrounded by uneven and waste strewn ground.

A Health and Safety Executive inspector, who looked at the machinery after the fatal incident, noted that there were several places where guards had been removed allowing access to dangerous parts of machinery. He said that the drive chain and conveyor belts were accessible and provided a realistic hazard should a person slip or fall into the unguarded area.

Evidence was read from an employee that when he started working for the company, Singh spent only a small amount of time showing him the trommel, and failed to explain the risks of working with the machinery, or to give any instructions for working safely.

Another employee who was paid to maintain and repair the lorries and machinery at the premises, including the trommel, admitted he had no formal qualifications or certificates as a mechanic.

The court heard that the company had failed to act on a series of warnings, including a letter sent to them in 2009 by a Health and Safety consultant, recommending specific risk assessments should be generated, giving immediate consideration to the trommel.

Birmingham Crown Court yesterday sentenced Singh to a 12 month suspended sentence and 300 hours community service. He was also disqualified from becoming a company director for eight years, and ordered to pay £11,500 in prosecution costs. The company, although in liquidation, was fined a total of £255,000.

Detective Constable Mark Harrison said: "This terrible tragedy is made so much worse by the fact it could have been avoided. It was almost inevitable that somebody was going to be seriously injured or killed, given that the company prioritised cost-cutting over safety. A culture of negligence resulted in this sad loss of life."

HSE Inspector Karl Raw said: "Firstly our thoughts remain with the family of Safi Qais Khan, following this tragic incident. This tragic death could have been avoided if basic safe guards had been put in place. This was an avoidable death of a person simply doing their job and HSE’s specialists fully supported this prosecution.

"The waste industry is a known high risk industry and for this reason HSE is currently targeting the sector with an inspection initiative that will look at certain activities to ensure effective management and control of risk."