Council Fined After Road Worker Dies

6 Mar 2010

After the hearing, HSE principal inspector John Rowe said: ‘The council had a duty to protect their employee. Yet, vehicle movements at the site were uncontrolled despite the fact that tipper wagons had to reverse the length of the site.’ He added: ‘The council were also aware that the worker was partially deaf as a result of exposure to noise at work - but had made no assessment of his suitability to continue as a road worker.’ A statement from Mr Duffield’s family said: ‘Losing someone you love in such a horrific way is an extremely difficult thing to come to terms with. Knowing their death could have been prevented makes the loss even more unbearable.’ It continued: ‘We can only hope that if anything positive can come out of the tragic circumstances we have found ourselves in, it is that lessons can be learned, and that lives can be saved through improved health and safety measures within companies and organisations in the same or similar industries.’