Industry news
£12,000 fine follows asbestos exposure
Posted Fri, 30 Oct 2009
A court has ordered two businesses and a company director to pay out £12,000 between them for exposing workers to potentially fatal asbestos.
Recon Packaging Ltd, from Ashton-under-Lyne, admitted breaching Regulation 4(3) of the Control of Asbestos at Work Regulations 2002. The judge at Trafford Magistrates' Court ordered them to pay costs of £5,000 and a £2,000 fine.
Both Stockport-based Industrial and Commercial Building Services Ltd and its Managing Director Kevin Bennet, from Marple, admitted breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. They were fined £2,000 each.
The court heard that ICBS employees came into contact with asbestos while demolishing part of the Recon Packaging recycling plant on Bower Street in Miles Platting, Manchester in early 2006.
Recon Packaging hired ICBS to carry out the work after the plant was severely damaged by fire in May 2005. The building included substantial amounts of asbestos but no site assessment was carried out, and ICBS was not licensed to remove it.
The prosecutions follow the launch of a £1.2m campaign by the Health and Safety Executive to raise awareness of asbestos risks.
Copyright © Press Association 2009
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