A Motherwell firm has been fined for safety failings after a worker was seriously injured when he fell more than four metres from the flat roof of a single storey extension being built at Ardrossan.

The 33-year old labourer, employed by Murdoch Mackenzie Construction Limited, was working on a farm in Ardrossan, on 23 February 2011, when he fell over an unprotected edge whilst walking backwards as he spread polythene sheeting on the flat roof.

The worker, from Larkhall, who has asked not to be named, landed on the ground below in a gap between newly installed decking and the building that was being extended. He suffered serious injuries including a fractured collar bone and bruising to his right lung. He needed an operation to insert a metal plate and bone graft to repair his collar bone.

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Kilmarnock Sheriff Court was told, that he was one of two men working on the roof, which had scaffolding to only two sides and no guard or handrails or other edge protection.

An investigation by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) revealed that there was a total lack of edge protection or any other means to prevent falls from height along the roof edge where the worker fell. The scaffolding had not been built around the full roof edge to allow patio doors to be fitted, but it was never assembled in that area even after the doors were put in. The work on the roof carried on and was therefore undertaken in an unsafe manner as a result.

Murdoch Mackenzie Construction Limited, of Coursington Road, Motherwell, Lanarkshire was fined £13,400 after pleading guilty to breaching Regulation 6(3) of the Work at Height Regulations 2005.

(CD/JP)