Worker's death costs firm £250,000
09/04/2010
A construction firm has been fined a quarter of a million pounds for causing the death of a 25-year-old worker more than five years ago.
Footage from a television documentary was used to help convict Hackney firm Regentford Ltd, whose failure to control health and safety at a building site led to mason and plasterer Balwinder Kumar falling from a scaffold in February 2005.
Mr Kumar later died in hospital from serious head injuries.
At the end of an eight-day trial in Croydon Crown Court, Regentford was found guilty of breaking Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974. The firm was fined £250,000 and ordered to pay just over £70,000 in costs.
The Health and Safety Executive later discovered the scaffold Mr Kumar was standing on at the time of his fall had been removed. It transpired that the BBC had filmed the scene while shooting a documentary about medical staff, who had treated Mr Kumar. The footage clearly showed the scaffold, surrounding guard rails and working platform to be in extremely poor condition.
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