Toyota pays £25,000 penalty for stepladder fall

Prosecutions and Claims |
14.01.2008

Car manufacturer Toyota has been fined £25,000 after a worker suffered serious injuries falling from a stepladder.

Employees Paul Gale and Andrew Tunnicliff were working at Toyota's plant in Burnaston, Derby. Tunnicliff had been tasked with fixing a three-metre length of Unistrut (steel channel) to the underside of a gantry and Gale was helping him. The gantry was 3.86m from the ground so they used the largest stepladders they could find, which were 2.5m high.

They positioned the two sets of stepladders side by side and climbed in tandem, each holding one end of the steel channel, which weighed 16 kilos. To screw the channel to the gantry, they had to lift it above head height. While they were at the top of the stepladders, Tunnicliff lost his balance. He toppled over and as he fell he knocked Gale off his ladders.

Tunnicliff was uninjured but Gale suffered a fractured skull, cheekbone and sinus; a fractured wrist; and multiple dislocations to his middle left finger.

HSE inspector Samantha Farrar told HSP that Toyota had failed to provide a safe system of work for the job. The work hadn't been properly planned or organised; work equipment to prevent a fall wasn't considered even though various options were available, including a fork-lift truck with a platform and a mobile elevating work platform; and information and training for employees were inadequate.

"Tunnicliff wasn't given any instruction on how to carry out the job or what work equipment to use," Farrar explained.

Toyota had also failed to carry out a suitable risk assessment for the specific task, even though it was a common job.

Toyota Motor Manufacturing (UK) pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work Act for failing to ensure the safety of employees, and Regulation 3(1)(a) of the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations for not carrying out a suitable risk assessment.

On 10 January, Derby magistrates fined Toyota £20,000 for the first breach and £5,000 for the second, plus costs of £3,321.