Despite the fact that we have a fairly good record when it comes to health and safety here in the UK, work accidents are still frighteningly common. As a firm of specialist injury lawyers we help a lot of victims for work accident claims and we often see trends in the nature of the accidents we help victims for.
Sometimes the happening of an accident should simply have never happened and was easy to prevent – the case of an unguarded chuck key in a lathe is one such example.
When a chuck key is not secured or is not guarded or shielded then it can easily cause a serious accident if it is ejected and hits an employee. It does happen and there are specific rules in place to ensure that employers share a duty to make sure that equipment like lathes are guarded and shielded properly.
The simplest piece of legislation to apply here is The Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations where there is a specific section dedicated to guarding and specific regulations for when it comes to shielding from guarding.
The relevant part here reads as follows:
12.—(1) Every employer shall take measures to ensure that the exposure of a person using work equipment to any risk to his health or safety from any hazard specified in paragraph (3) is either prevented, or, where that is not reasonably practicable, adequately controlled.
(3) The hazards referred to in paragraph (1) are—
(a)any article or substance falling or being ejected from work equipment;
You’ll see that regulation 12(3)(a) is particularly relevant here. With this text being enshrined in law, your employer can be directly responsible where you are hit by an ejecting chuck key when using or working nearby a lathe.
So what does this mean?
It means that you may have a valid claim for work injury compensation. If you are injured by an ejecting chuck key from a lathe, or in similar circumstances, we can probably help you claim on a no win, no fee basis.
We only ever use our exclusive no win, no fee for cases where we believe we can fight the claim and win you a settlement. For help and advice call now on 0800 634 7575.
