The construction industry has stepped-up its efforts to combat work-related stress and promote good mental health by joining Great Britain’s workplace regulator campaign.  The Working Minds campaign, set up by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), welcomes six new partners in the construction industry to help reach trades and offer free support.

An unregistered plumber has received a suspended prison sentence after he carried out illegal gas work at a house in Peterborough.  Anthony Rice, trading as Rice Plumbing and Oil Heating, attended the property on Edwalton Avenue on 31 January 2023 where he replaced a gas boiler and altered gas pipe work. However, Rice accidentally connected the gas supply with water, meaning the property’s gas pipes and gas meter were flooded.

  TWO former directors of a trampoline park in Ellesmere Port whose health and safety failings led to 270 injuries in just eight weeks have been ordered to pay over £70,000.    David Elliott Shuttleworth and Matthew Melling, both 34, were the directors of Flip Out Chester, based at Chester Gates Business Park and which opened on December 11, 2016.

A recycling company in Wales has been fined £300,000 after a father-of-two was killed by a shovel loader.  Anthony Bilton, from Barry, Vale of Glamorgan, lost his life on 4 September 2019 when he was run over from behind by a Volvo shovel loader at Atlantic Recycling Limited’s Atlantic Ecopark site in Cardiff.

Two former directors of a caravan park at Talybont near Barmouth have each been ordered to pay more than £160,000 between them after an employee suffered serious hand injuries. The incident occurred at the caravan park operated by Sunnysands Caravan Park Limited, on 12 May 2020.

A recycling company in West Yorkshire has been fined £120,000 after batteries weighing at least 300kg fell onto an employee and severely injured him.  The man was working with two colleagues at Wastecare Limited’s site on North Dean Business Park, Halifax when he was struck by the batteries being recycled on 22 March 2019.

  A worker lost a finger and another badly injured his hand after health and safety breaches at a Bolton based company, a court heard.    Both men were working at Stateside Foods, a well known pizza maker, in 2020 when the two separate incidents happened.    Now four years on, Bolton Crown Court heard how a “roller” put in between two conveyor belts had lead to the first accident in January 2020.

The Health and Safety Executive reported that nearly two million workers in Great Britain reported suffering ill-health as a result of their work in 2022/23, with around half these cases due to stress, depression or anxiety.  As well as workers who report mental ill-health, there may well be many individuals who have experiences and symptoms that employers are not aware of.

The Health and Safety Executive is looking into the collapse of a balcony at an £81million apartment complex in Barking, east London.  Huge pieces of timber and other debris crashed to the ground outside Weavers Quarter in the Gascoigne East estate. There were concerns about three other balconies.

Menopause symptoms can be considered a disability and employers face being sued if they do not make 'reasonable adjustments', a watchdog has said.   The Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) issued the guidance to clarify the legal obligations to workers going through the menopause.