Firm fined after apprentice has thumb crushed
GoogleA company has been ordered to pay almost £150,000 after a 17-year-old apprentice was injured by a metal cutting guillotine.
The teenager's thumb was crushed during a training session at MTL Advanced Ltd, on Grange Lane, Rotherham, on 8 November 2024.
The metal fabrication firm, based in Darwen, Lancashire, was fined £140,000 and ordered to pay costs of £5,013, with a victim surcharge of £2,000, at Sheffield Magistrates' Court on Friday.
"Had this machinery been effectively guarded, this injury would never have happened," said Chris Tilley, the principal inspector of health and safety at the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), which brought the prosecution against MTL Advanced.
The apprentice's thumb was injured after it came into contact with the machine's clamps, with the HSE later identifying "a large gap in the bed of the guillotine", which was allowing access to dangerous parts of the machinery.
"Critically, the company had failed to identify this risk even after the incident had taken place," a HSE spokesperson said.
A wider inspection of the company's Apprentice Training Workshop, where the incident occurred, revealed additional health and safety failings, including access to live electrical parts, further instances of unguarded dangerous machinery, and deficiencies in the system of inspection for workshop equipment.
They subsequently pleaded guilty to breaching the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations.
Tilley said: "Young people and apprentices are at the beginning of their career and so when it comes to workplace risks, employers must take particular care to assess those risks and fulfil their duty to keep them safe."
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