Lawford Kidd's Blog

According to figures obtained by the Scottish Conservatives under Freedom of Information legislation, councils in Scotland have paid out over £33 million to settle around 13,000 compensation claims over the past five years.

The data reveals a wide range of claims, including a man in Edinburgh who claimed £170,000 after a firework blew up in his hand; and a person in Glasgow who got their jacket caught on a bin hoist and was lifted into the air, which has so far cost £250 in legal fees.

According to the Scottish Conservatives, the actual cost is likely to be higher than the current figures indicate, as some councils failed to respond to the information request, and there are still some outstanding cases waiting to be resolved.

An Edinburgh food firm has been fined after a worker seriously injured his hand on an unguarded dough mixer.

Edinburgh Sheriff Court heard that Joseph Burnett had been employed as a factory assistant for almost four months and helped to sort ingredients, make Chinese dumplings to order and package products.

On the day of the incident he was working on an industrial-sized dough mixer, into which ingredients and water are placed. Paddles then rotate to mix the ingredients into dough.

RoSPA is urging other parts of the UK to consider lowering the drink-drive limit after publishing a response to the proposal in Scotland.

Experts estimate that a 50mg limit would save between 77 and 168 lives a year in England and Wales, which could increase to as many as 300 lives annually by the 6th year.

The Scottish Government's consultation paper suggests that a lower limit could save as many as 17 lives a year on Scotland’s roads.

The Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) has called on the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) not to water down but to implement in full a European Directive to prevent so-called ‘sharp injuries’.

APIL was responding to a HSE consultation on the subject. In its response, APIL stated that the draft regulations were ambiguous and contained loopholes which may leave some workers unprotected.

“If, as proposed, the regulations only apply to an employer whose ‘main activity’ is healthcare, then an organisation which provides healthcare services as well as services in other sectors, like aviation for instance, may be exempt from the regulations altogether,” said APIL president Karl Tonks. “Surely this would undermine the entire point of having regulations in the first place, as they are meant to ensure people’s safety across the board.

An Essex packaging company has been fined after one of its employees sustained a serious hand injury on an unguarded laminating machine.

Gary Dean had the skin on the palm of his left hand torn away in the incident on 26th September 2011.

He was using a glue laminating machine when he noticed an indent mark on a finished product. He put his left hand into the machine via an unguarded portal to scrape away dried glue residue from a roller that had caused the blemish, but his whole hand was drawn into the roller and the palm of his left hand was de-gloved.