A BROMYARD labourer who fractured his pelvis after falling six metres from an unsafe fork-lift ‘man cage’, is unable to work a year later.

His long-time employer, Clive Watkins, apologised at a Health and Safety hearing at Hereford Magistrates court in Hereford, and was handed a £5,000 fine.

The pair had been removing two steel plates from the roof of a farming building in Docklow, near Leominster last October.

However after high winds made the removal of the second panel problematic, the 52-year-old – who did not wish to be named in court – attempted to climb out of the cage and on to a ladder positioned against the building.

Kieron Jones, representing the Health and Safety Executive, said: “There was a certain inevitability that things would end badly.”

The Bromyard man was thrown from the platform, an attachment which Watkins had failed to check had been secured after arriving on site, breaking his pelvis and suffering lacerations to the skull, before being air-lifted to hospital, the court heard.

Watkins, who has been a steel fabricator for forty years, had never undergone formal training to use a forklift, his representative James Ageros told the court, however he had received extensive, more informal training over the years.

The sixty-year-old from Almeley Road, Eardisley has since rectified this.

He pleaded guilty to breaching Regulation 4(1) of the work at Height Regulations 2005, and was also ordered to pay £385 in costs.

His employee, the court heard, will be covered under Watkins’ insurance policy.

Mr Jones said: “The incident was entirely preventable and resulted from a lack of competence by the person in control of the work – Clive Watkins. “

He added that falls from height are the biggest cause of death in the construction industry, accounting for half of all fatalities.

Advice on managing the risk is available at www.hse.gov.uk/work-at-height .