NEWS
PROSECUTION AFTER COUNCIL WORKER CRUSHED AT LONDON WASTE FACILITY
A waste and recycling company has been fined £400,000 after a council worker was crushed at a waste facility in London.
Paul McDaid, an Enfield Council employee, was working at the London Energy Ltd transfer station in Edmonton, London, on 13th May 2022 when a shovel loader reversed into him. The 58-year-old had been closing the tailgate on his tractor after tipping waste into a nearby bay, when the vehicle reversed without realizing he was there and crushed him between both vehicles. He sustained very serious injuries.
The company was undergoing major construction work and the area where the incident occurred was a temporary unit. An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found the work was not suitably risk assessed and appropriate control measures were not implemented.
The investigation also found the company had also failed to implement suitable controls to segregate pedestrians and vehicles for which detailed guidance is available. Where vehicles and pedestrians share a traffic route there must be enough separation between them. This
WORKER HAS LEG AMPUTATED FOLLOWING FALL
A Norfolk-based food wholesaler has been prosecuted after an employee’s leg had to be amputated after he was injured while loading a lorry.
The worker was loading an HGV using a pallet truck at Osprey Foods Limited, in Holt, Norfolk on 5 July 2023.
The HGV pulled away while the man was still inside the trailer, causing both him and the pallet truck to fall between the loading dock and the rear of the vehicle. The injuries he sustained were so severe his leg had to be amputated.
An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found that Osprey Foods had not taken appropriate measures to control vehicle movements on their site. The traffic light system used to tell the HGV drivers when it was safe to move their vehicles had broken several weeks prior to the incident and had not been repaired. The traffic light remained green during the loading process, meaning that the driver pulled away thinking it was safe to do so and unaware that the man was still in the back of the vehicle.
Osprey Foods Limited, of Holt, Norfolk, pleaded guilty to breaching sections 2 (1) and 3 (1) of the Health and Safety
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at Work etc Act 1974. The company was fined £66,000 and ordered to pay £5,850 in costs at Peterborough Magistrates’ Court on 20 June 2025.
HSE inspector Natalie Prince said: “Every year, a significant number of incidents, many of them serious and sometimes fatal, occur as a result of failure to manage vehicles moving around safely.
“In this case, a simple repair to a traffic light system has resulted in a worker suffering life-changing injuries.”
can normally be achieved through the use of physical barriers and safe systems of work.
London Energy Ltd of Ecopark, Advent Way, Edmonton, London, pleaded guilty to breaching Section 3(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. The company was fined £400,000 and ordered to pay £5,573 in costs at Westminster Magistrates’ Court on 27 June 2025.
HSE inspector Pippa Knott said: “Due to the failings of this company a man has been left with very serious injuries. They failed to segregate pedestrians and vehicles, putting both employees and council workers at risk. Too many workers are injured every year as a result of being struck by moving vehicles which could be avoided by implementing suitable control measures.”
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