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March/April 2023 issue

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News

Director jailed for company’s REACH violation

Open-access content Monday 7th January 2019
From the archive:  Just so you know, this article is more than 3 years old.

Director jailed for company's REACH violation

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) had been alerted that Nuneaton-based Abel (UK) was selling a weed killer containing sodium chlorate by a complainant in August 2014. Sodium chlorate is not approved for use in weed killers because a safe level of use has not been established.

The business was also selling paint stripper containing dichloromethane (DCM) a restricted substance under Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH) Regulation.

DCM's use has been restricted because its use can be harmful to human health and has resulted in fatalities when it is not used properly.

The HSE found Abel (UK) had also failed to check at the point of sale that the paint stripper containing DCM was either being sold for use in industrial installations or, after October 2016, to appropriately certified professionals, a condition of its sale.

The regulator worked with online resellers to remove advertisements for these products and served enforcement notices to prohibit further supply. However, Abel (UK), whose services included mobile truck and fleet washing and pressure-washer street cleaning before it was dissolved on 30 January 2018, ignored the notices.

Nicholas Corbett, who currently runs Abel Group (Midlands) in Atherstone, Warwickshire following the closure of Abel (UK), pleaded guilty to breaching regs 9 and 18 of the Plant Protection Products Regulations 2011 and reg 10 of REACH Enforcement Regulations 2008 at Warwick Crown Court.

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 Hundreds caught waterborne infection in dirty pool

Friday 18th January 2019
Ryan Griffin, 27, pleaded guilty to breaching two offences under the Health and Safety at Work Act. On 16 January at York Magistrates' Court he was given a community order for 12 months with a 25-day rehabilitation activity requirement and ordered to pay £1,500 prosecution costs. Environmental health officers from the City of York Council described the pool at Dolphins Swim School as dirty, "with a brown and green colour ["¦] and emitting a pungent smell", when they visited the premises in September 2015.
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 Shell fined S$400k after six workers suffered burns in Pulau Bukom fire

Friday 11th January 2019
Six workers were injured in the blaze, including two who sustained over 50 per cent burns on their bodies.  The oil giant was charged under s 11(a) of Singapore's Workplace Safety and Health Act for failing to coordinate hot and cold works in close proximity and was fined S$400,000 (£231,625). The incident happened on 21 August 2015 when two groups of workers were carrying out maintenance work on a crude distillation unit.
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 Bakery handed £159k fine for exposing workers to flour dust

Tuesday 11th December 2018
Coopland & Son (Scarborough) failed to suppress airborne dust at its Eastfield bakery in Scarborough between April 2002 and April 2016. Two employees were diagnosed with occupational asthma while a third had developed symptoms. The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found multiple failings in the company's management system for controlling dust, which consisted of three elements: a risk assessment document, air sampling to measure flour levels and a health surveillance regime.
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 HSE launches two-month farm inspection campaign

Monday 7th January 2019
Inspectors will focus on issues including machinery, falls from height, child safety and risk posed by livestock. In October and November 2018, the HSE ran a series of agriculture compliance events in South West and Eastern England, Wales and Scotland, which focused on the practical steps that farms can take to ensure compliance ahead of the inspection visits. The events were developed as a result of research into farmers' attitudes to risk and were aimed at changing industry behaviours.
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 Fire service safety audits drop 42% in seven years

Friday 4th January 2019
A report by Her Majesty's Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS), found that, in the 12 months to 31 March 2018, fire and rescue services conducted 49,423 audits. In the 12 months to 31 March 2011 the comparable figure was 84,575.
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 Construction cos’ ceiling tile oversight exposed workers to asbestos

Friday 11th January 2019
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) found PC Ashe Construction had appointed cladding installer Cladceil to carry out the refurbishment at Oakwood Junior school in Derby on 1 August 2016 during the school holidays. The Nottingham-based company had subcontracted the work to another company and its workers had been asked to remove suspended ceiling tiles from rooms in the school.
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  Morrisons’ £3.5m fine is ‘a warning to all employers’, says council

Friday 24th March 2023
Morrisons supermarket has been fined £3.5 million for failing to ensure the health and safety of an epileptic employee who died after falling from a shop stairway.
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 IOSH launches new five-year strategy

Tuesday 21st March 2023
IOSH launches its new five-year strategy this spring. It will build and act on the reshaped purpose and ambition gained during WORK 2022, which ran from 2017 to 2022.
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 Risk & Compliance software provider collaborates with HSE and Costain to improve risk management on worksites

Friday 17th March 2023
A Belfast-based Risk & Compliance software provider has been collaborating with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and construction giant Costain as part of an ongoing project to unlock artificial intelligence’s (AI) potential in improving the management of risks on worksites.
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Friday 24th March 2023
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 Akzonobel company fined £800,000 after explosion

Friday 9th December 2022
Akzonobel company fined £800,000 after explosion A worker was left with all-over body scarring, partial blindness and hearing damage after an explosion at a chemicals firm.
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CSB safety video of fatal hydrogen sulphide incident released to improve US industry practices

 Safety video of fatal hydrogen sulphide incident released to improve US industry practices

Friday 6th August 2021
The US Chemical Safety Board (CSB) has released a new safety video to improve practices in the oil and gas sector following the Aghorn Operating waterflood station incident in 2019, which claimed the lives of an employee and his spouse.
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 In stats: A global view of cancer

Wednesday 31st August 2022
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 SCUBA supplier fined £9.3k in schoolboy coma case

Friday 6th August 2021
A SCUBA equipment supply company has been fined £9,300 and ordered to pay £11,000 costs after providing a diving school with contaminated air that led to children being taken so ill during a training session that one ended up in an induced coma.
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 WorkSafe New Zealand launches Life Shavers campaign

Thursday 3rd June 2021
WorkSafe’s Life Shavers campaign will raise awareness of the need for workers who wear respiratory protective equipment (RPE) for work to be clean shaven.
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 Director was unfairly dismissed as H&S officer did not raise concerns over cryo-chamber installation

Wednesday 9th November 2022
A director who had installed a cryotherapy chamber was unfairly dismissed, a tribunal has ruled, because the technical director and principal health and safety officer at the business failed to raise concerns about the work undertaken.
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 HSE report highlights risks posed by hazardous atmospheres in freight containers at ports and distribution centres

Friday 4th November 2022
Research published by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has identified some weaknesses in the control measures at a number of ports and distribution centres in relation to workers coming into contact with hazardous substances when examining or unloading freight containers.
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