A major mid-Essex employer has been fined £4,000 for a Health and safety breach that led to a worker losing part of a finger.

At Witham Magistrates' Court yesterday Grampian Country Foods, of Freebournes Road, Witham, admitted breaching a section of the Health and Safety at Work Act relating to the safety of non-employees.

The company admitted not fitting a chicken de-rinding machine at its Witham plant with adequate guards and not providing sufficient training and information in relation to cleaning the machine.

The court heard that Habib Rasoolzade, a 24-year-old Iranian asylum seeker and agency worker who spoke little or no English was cleaning the machine manually on May 23, his second day of work, when he trapped the little finger of his left hand in the working machine.

The finger was severely damaged and had to be partially amputated.

Company policy was that the machine should be switched off and cleaned with a water jet but Ian Cotgrove, prosecuting, said employees responsible for briefing agency workers were off sick.

Ian Mayers, mitigating, said: "The company is guilty in law as the owners and operators of the machine."

But he added that the Grampian plant had been operating in Witham for 35 years without any health and safety convictions and had been let down by the manufacturers of the machine, which they understood to be safe.

A charge relating to the section of the Health and Safety at Work Act dealing with employees' safety was not proceeded with.

Magistrates imposed a £4,000 fine and ordered the company to pay £1,322 prosecution costs.

No compensation order was made as a civil case is being brought elsewhere by Mr Rasoolzade.

After the case, Alfred Robinson, head of risk management for Grampian Country Foods, said: "We deeply regret this has happened and have taken steps to make sure it won't happen again."

Published Tuesday, April 9, 2002