Two separate incidents at its Burton-on-Trent site have cost brewer Molson Coors more than £121,000 in total fines and costs. 
The company, which says it is the UK’s largest brewer, appeared before Cannock magistrates on 4th  August to answer charges in relation to two incidents at its Station Street site in 2008.

In the first, which occurred on 20th May, a delivery driver had arrived at the site to unload a trailer of empty cans. Peter Jackson, 64, was walking along the ‘hydro’ lines in the canning hall to find a space to deliver his load. As he walked down the side of the lines that was nearest the forklift truck route he was struck by one of the vehicles, which trapped his left leg beneath its forks. Mr Jackson’s foot and left wrist were fractured and he has been unable to return to work since the incident.

Investigating HSE inspector Lynn Spooner found that the company had failed to fully act on advice she had provided in relation to workplace transport and pedestrian segregation during a previous visit to the site in December 2007. She said:

“This incident occurred because of inadequate risk assessments, poor management and monitoring of contractors, and managers failing to understand their responsibilities for health and safety.

“Not only had poor workplace transport arrangements persisted over many years but Molson Coors also failed to follow previous advice from the HSE. As a result, Mr Jackson was seriously injured in an incident that could easily have been fatal.”

The second incident for which the company was prosecuted on the same day happened just over a month after the first – on 30 June 2008. Three sub-contractors from a specialist engineering company were undertaking maintenance work at the Station Street site, working on ‘clean in place’ plant.
The magistrates heard that the men should have carried out four isolations on the machine on which they were working, but they didn’t isolate a valve under the detergent tank. As they were repairing the valve on a line running from the tank they were drenched in a liquid jet of caustic soda. One of the men was temporarily blinded, one suffered 25-per-cent burns, which have left him with scars and continuing sensitivity to heat, and the third suffered minor skin burns and irritation to his eyes.

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