Factory's £10k compensation bill for teen's injury

A GRIMSBY factory will have to pay out almost £10,000 after a teenager suffered serious injuries when his arm was trapped in machinery.

Icelandic Group UK – which operates the Coldwater factory, on Pyewipe Road – has been fined £3,500 and must pay court costs of £6,477 after Luke Oxton was injured in October 2007.

As reported, Mr Oxton, who was 19 at the time, was freed by firefighters after he was trapped in machinery for over an hour.

He has not been returned to work since the incident on October 12, 2007.

The news came as the Grimsby Telegraph discovered North East Lincolnshire is in the bottom 25 per cent of the country when it comes to the amount of people that are injured at work.

For every 100,000 employees in our area, a shocking 778.8 will be injured, leading to 2.8-million working days being lost due to injury or work-related ill health in the Yorkshire and Humber region in 2007/08.

In the same period, 16 local workers were killed at work.

In the case of Mr Oxton, Grimsby Magistrates were told that the company failed keep a guard on a vent – which prevented access to a dangerous rotating auger – in good working order.

Mr Oxton was trapped while he was cleaning the vent.

The company was prosecuted under the Health and Safety at Work Act and admitted breaching it's general duty to an employee.

In a statement, Icelandic Group UK said: "Icelandic Group UK Limited is a local company for whom health and safety is the top priority. Our health and safety record at the Grimsby plant is excellent .

"We very much regret Mr Oxton's accident and are assisting him in his rehabilitation with the aim of returning him to employment at the earliest opportunity.

"As a responsible company we have learned lessons from this incident and implemented a major training programme for all employees and management to recognised national standards.

"We aim to provide local people with a safe working environment as part of our continuous improvement programme."

During 2007/08, the health and safety executive prosecuted 124 employers, securing convictions against 104.

The average fine imposed was £5,942.

Local authorities brought 40 cases, all of which led to a successful convictions, with an average fine of £4,375.