Firm fined after 16-year-old worker’s finger amputated
A BILSTON food production company has been fined after a 16-year-old worker had to have his finger amputated.
The teenager, who cannot be named, was clearing a blockage on a biscuit crumbing machine at Phoenix Brands on November 25 last year.
He reached too far into the hopper and his right hand was pulled into a screw conveyor, a machine which uses a rotating screw blade to break biscuits as they travel up a tube.
He injured a number of fingers but his middle finger was so badly damaged it had to be amputated.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) brought a prosecution against the firm after its investigation found that both the hopper and the screw conveyor were unguarded and had been since the machine was bought several years earlier.
Wolverhampton Magistrates’ Court was told that the worker left the company following the incident as it was only intended to be a part-time job until he started a college plumbing course. He missed two months of the course but has since made good progress and is catching up with his peers.
Phoenix Brands Limited, of the Atlas Trading Estate, Cross Street, Bilston, pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 11(1) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998. Wolverhampton magistrates fined the company £7,000 with full costs of £4,000.
HSE inspector David Evans said: “To be injured so seriously just a few weeks into his working life has been profoundly upsetting for this young man. The incident was entirely avoidable.
“The risks of clearing blockages had not been properly identified. If they had been, workers would not have been able to access dangerous moving parts of machinery.”
