A GLASGOW-BASED agriculture company has been fined £80,000 after an employee sustained several serious injuries due to a breach in health and safety rules.
Grayshill Limited, a company specialising in the removal and disposal of fallen livestock, pleaded guilty to breaching health and safety regulations after an employee suffered a skull fracture, a broken clavicle, a ripped earlobe and haematomas down his right side.
An investigation found this was caused by being struck by a telehandler bucket while working at Grayshill Limited on 19 October 2022. The worker had been removing cattle from the back of a lorry when a telehandler bucket detached and struck him.
A telehandler is a vehicle used for transporting heavy materials and is commonly used in the construction and agricultural sectors. They can alternate attachments for the vehicle’s arm from a forklift, or a bucket similar to that found on diggers.
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE), the national regulator for workplace health and safety procedures, concluded that the firm had failed to implement a safe system of work.
The HSE found that the incident was caused when a quick hitch, a latching device which connects a bucket to a telehandler’s arm, had not been reinserted.
A manual quick hitch requires an operator to manually insert a metal pin from the latching device to secure the attachment.
On the morning of October 19 2022, a self-employed agricultural engineer had serviced the vehicle, which involved removing the bucket. The engineer then proceeded to incorrectly reattach it onto the telehandler after the service was complete, it was found.
HSE principal inspector Hazel Dobb said this was a serious incident that had resulted in a worker sustaining horrific injuries.
She said: "We thoroughly investigated this incident and found Grayshill failed to carry out the correct control measures and safe working practices at its site in Glasgow.
"The company also failed to check its vehicles after they had been serviced and repaired to ensure they were safe for use.”
