UK Construction and Law
A gate hit by a forklift and never properly repaired has cost a processing company 451,500 pounds
By Staff Writer | 30 August 2026
A supervisor clearing a blockage found the interlocking safety gate hard to open, took out a loose panel instead and was struck repeatedly by a palletiser that restarted while he was inside it. The damage to the gate dated from early 2024 and the fine was handed down at Lerwick Sheriff Court.
The machine was fenced. The fence had an interlocking gate designed to isolate the power supply whenever it was opened. That is the arrangement the regulations expect where an operator has to get to a dangerous part, and on paper the plant had it.
In early 2024 a forklift truck struck the gate. The blow damaged the locking mechanism and the gate became difficult to open. A panel in the fencing was left loose. Nothing was done to restore the fencing to a state where the gate was the only way in.
Blockages in the palletiser were frequent. Two senior members of staff got into the habit of lifting out the loose panel and stepping over the fence line to clear them, without isolating the power first. On 10 October 2024 the forklift supervisor did exactly that, walked along a stationary conveyor towards the blockage, and crossed a sensor. The machine restarted. He was struck repeatedly by its pushers until a colleague reached an emergency stop.
The injuries and the sentence
He was treated at the scene by first aiders and airlifted to hospital, where he spent 10 days in intensive care and a further 10 in a high dependency unit. He suffered eight fractured ribs, a pelvis fractured in five places, a fractured clavicle and scapula, and two collapsed lungs. He was later moved for rehabilitation and has said he does not wish to return to the role.
The company pleaded guilty to breaching regulations 11(1) and (2) of the Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations 1998, and section 33(1)(c) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. It was fined 420,000 pounds and ordered to pay a victim surcharge of 31,500 pounds, a total of 451,500 pounds, at Lerwick Sheriff Court on 26 August 2026.
Interlocking guards exist for one reason: to stop people reaching dangerous machinery while it's still live. When that gate was damaged, it should have been repaired properly and its integrity restored immediately, not left in a state where a determined employee could simply lift out a panel and walk into a hazardous area.
Matty Spiers, inspector at the Health and Safety Executive
The failure was in maintenance, not in design
Nobody suggested the guarding was wrong when it was installed. Regulation 11 requires measures to prevent access to a dangerous part, and where fixed enclosing guarding is not practicable, other guards or protection devices. The duty does not stop when the guard is fitted. Equipment has to be maintained in efficient working order and in good repair, and a guard whose interlock no longer works is a guard in name only.
What made this incident foreseeable was the combination of three ordinary things: a physical impact from another item of plant, a repair that was deferred, and a production pressure that gave people a reason to find a way round. The workaround had been running long enough to become a habit among senior staff, which means it was visible to anyone looking.
The company notified the regulator on the day. It has since reinstated the perimeter fencing so that the gate is the only means of access, and has made clear to staff that bypassing safety barriers is a disciplinary matter.
The point for anyone running plant
Damage caused by vehicle movements is one of the most common routes to a defeated guard, and it is rarely recorded as a safety event when it happens. A forklift clipping a fence is treated as damage to a fence. The lesson here is to treat any impact on a guard, an interlock or a barrier as a safety defect that isolates the machine until it is repaired and proved, and to close out the repair rather than leaving a loose panel behind. Where a blockage recurs often enough that people are entering the machine regularly, the right question is why it blocks, because a workaround will always be quicker than the correct procedure and somebody will find it.