£100,000 fines for UK council and demolition contractor.
Rotherham Council and demolition contractor Brocklebank have been fined over £100,000 ($110,000) after a worker was killed by a reversing truck during a road surfacing operation.
Gordon Duffield, a council employee, was knocked down by an eight-wheeled tipper wagon operated by Brocklebank, as it delivered asphalt to a site on Fitzwilliam Road, Rotherham, on 4 May 2007.
Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Council was fined £75,000 and ordered to pay £18,350 costs in relation to the incident after pleading guilty to a section 2(1) breach of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 at Doncaster Crown Court.
Sheffield-based Brocklebank also pleaded guilty to a breach of section 3(1) of the same legislation, and was fined £30,000 and ordered to pay £12,000 costs.
Coming just a few days after a US demolition company was fined the paltry sum of $4,200 (£2,800) over the accidental death of a worker, we have to ask why there is such a vast discrepancy on either side of the Atlantic and, of course, whether £100,000 is a more accurate cost of a human life.
My own personal feeling is that a human life is beyond cost; but £100,000 is far closer than
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