09.22.09
Pregnant Woman Gets Compensation for Injury
Hartlepool resident Andrea Swales, a civil servant by profession, was paid £9,000 as compensation by her employer HM Revenue and Customs in Peterlee after she suffered an injury on her back. The injury was caused when she accidentally slipped in her office after stepping on an unfastened carpet tile.
Commenting on the incident, Janice Hook from Thompsons Solicitors said that Ms Swales met with the accident at a time when she was in a delicate condition. She was lucky to have fallen on a seat and protect herself and her unborn child. Ms Hook believes that this accident must have prompted the employer HM Revenue and Customs to take adequate safety measures so that incidents like these do not get repeated.
The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union of which Ms Swales is a member also gave a statement through Emma Wiles, its Director of Legal Services. She said that such incidents have become a day-to-day affair and that they can be averted by employers who are supposed to have a safety inspection programme in place to keep all the passageways safe.
Employers have a duty towards ensuring health and safety of the workers; an IOSH course can be of benefit to organisations in providing the knowledge to manage safely and effectively in compliance with both the organisation’s policy and best practice in health and safety and it can also be tailored to meet the needs of any particular organisation - click on NEBOSH Distance Learning for a unique web-based training programme from Workplace Law leading to the award of the NEBOSH National General Certificate in Occupational Safety and Health.
The incident happened in July 2006 when Andrea, now 39, was nearly five months into her pregnancy. She fell on a seat to protect her child but in such an awkward manner that she hurt her back. She started suffering from back pains and it was six weeks later during a post-pregnancy check up that she learnt that the pain was due to the accident. She then had to go through physiotherapy and take steroid injections to get rid of the pain. However, she will continue to suffer from back problems, which in normal cases should have started nine years later, the doctors say.
After this recent compensation, employers have been exhorted to be mindful of their duties to protect workers against such risks.
