The director of an asbestos surveying firm has been fined £5,000 after not spotting the material at a demolition site.
Shay James, director of Amencon Ltd, was employed by Bovis Homes to carry out a survey on a site to be used as a new housing development. However, Mr James and a colleague failed to identify over 1,000 square metres of asbestos insulation board and lagging, resulting in part of the site being demolished without putting proper asbestos management processes in place.
James pleaded guilty to a breach of the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 and was sentenced at Leicester Magistrates Court. After the hearing HSE inspector Stephen Farthing said that James had carried out a very poor survey and that as a consequence, "a building was demolished that contained asbestos and contractors were put at risk from exposure which is completely unacceptable."
http://www.hse.gov.uk/press/2011/coi-em-16311.htm?eban=rss-press-release
