Lawford Kidd's Blog

The Government has announced plans to begin a major cut back of health and safety legislation as early as January. It will begin an immediate consultation on the abolition of large numbers of health and safety regulations and intends to have removed the first rules from the statute book within a few months.

It will also establish from 1st January a new challenge panel which will allow businesses to get the decisions of health and safety inspectors overturned immediately if they have got it wrong.

The move follows the publication of the Löfstedt Review into health and safety legislation, commissioned by the Employment Minister in March.

A Dartford firm has been fined after an employee was seriously injured when he was crushed by a reversing lorry at the KBC Logistics depot in Essex.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE), prosecuting, told Basildon Magistrates’ Court that driver Leslaw Chorazak, 54, was waiting to take his place at the wheel of the articulated 45ft heavy goods vehicle.

Mr Chorazak was guiding the returning driver as he reversed the lorry into the poorly lit yard. As he bent to pick up his torch, the driver lost sight of him and continued to reverse, crushing him between the back of the lorry and the office wall.

A national malt company, Pauls Malt Limited, has been fined after a worker had to have the lower part of his left leg amputated, when he became entangled in machinery inside a grain silo. His right leg was also badly broken and is still held together by plates and pins.