Contractor fined £10,000 after worker fall

A Swansea man has been fined £10,000 after a worker was seriously injured following a fall at work.

Arthur David Fletcher, who was principal contractor and construction manager of the site of a new supermarket in Station Road, Penclawdd, pleaded guilty to breaching the Health and Safety at Work Act when he appeared at Swansea Magistrates Court.

He was also ordered to pay £6,257.40 in costs.

Fletcher's employee Dorian Skippon suffered serious leg injuries when he was working with three others on a temporary floor at the site in 2006 when the joist collapsed.

HSE inspector Anne-Marie Orrells said: "Falls from height are the single most common cause of fatalities in the construction industry and Mr Skippon is still experiencing the effect of his injuries more than two years later."

She added that despite the incident, an unannounced inspection by HSE just over a month later showed that there was still a failure to manage risks from working at height including: no guard rails on scaffolding, poor access from the building to external scaffolding, and unprotected areas large enough for workers to fall through.