Injuries Direct - Personal Injury Claims

A heating engineer has won an employment tribunal compensation claim against his employer.

Jonathon Baskeyfield has been awarded £4,000 after a court decided that he had been a victim of unfair dismissal from his work; CM Renewable Energy Ltd.

The company, based in Burslem , Stoke-on-Trent sacked Mr Baskeyfield after accusing him of using company vans for his own personal use.

He told the panel that they were using the reason as an excuse to get rid of him and insisted that he had done nothing wrong.

He said: “There was not much work available at the time and I was using the van only for work. I have a good reputation in the Stoke-on-Trent area.”

His claim was broken down into a month’s wages of £1,810, £417 in notice pay and £1,671 as compensation.

Mr Baskeyfield has now found another job. CM Renewable Energy refused to comment.

A Royal Mail driver has been cleared of work accident health and safety breaches after the truck he was driving crushed a colleague to death.

Ian Wheeler, 42, had been trying to link the tractor he was driving to a trailer at Royal Mail’s Heathrow Worldwide distribution centre near Slough when the accident happened in September 2006.

Fellow worker Colin Smith, who had no hearing in one ear, was standing between the vehicle and the trailer. Mr Wheeler failed to notice him there and he was subsequently crushed, suffering fatal injuries.

The driver was taken to court for health and safety breaches which stated he failed to discharge hit duty properly. However, after denying the charges he was cleared if any wrongdoing.

It was previously believed that Mr Wheeler had been distracted by his mobile phone, on which he had received a call from his son at the moment of the accident. These claims were later dismissed as irrelevant.

Being hit by vehicles is the second most common cause of accidents at work, with 1,875 incidents in 2006/2007.  The reason for why Mr Smith was in between the vehicle and the trailer is unknown.

A Sunday league footballer has been jailed for breaking an opponent’s leg during a match.

Mark Chapman, 20, is the first player to be jailed because of a tackle. He will serve six months.

His victim, 26-year-old Terry Johnson suffered a broken tibia and fibula and has had a metal rod screwed in with four bolts inserted into his leg. It is unlikely that he will every get to play again.

Mr Johnson has also been unable carry out his job as an electrician, meaning he has faced a struggle to support his partner and two young daughters.

During the match between the players’ teams Long Lawford and Wheeltappers, Mr Chapman had been criticised by team mates for showing a lack of effort.

Close to the final whistle, as Mr Johnson was protecting the ball as it went out of play. While he was doing this, Mr Chapman closed in and used a ‘stamping motion’ with his right foot with studs showing as he went into the side and back of Mr Johnson’s right leg.

It was revealed in court that although Mr Chapman had no previous convictions, he had been disciplined for his behaviour on the football pitch a number of times.

Sentencing Mr Chapman to six months in prison for grievous bodily harm, Judge Robert Orme said: “This is a deliberate act, a premeditated act. A football match gives no-one any excuse to carry out wanton violence.

“The result of what you did was that Mr Johnson suffered a badly broken leg – it horrified those who saw it.”

It is likely that Mr Johnson will now be entitled to make an injury compensation claim, to recover damages for his injuries, his inability to continue playing football and for his loss of earnings at his paid job.

Former workers of a Lancashire paper mill are lining up to make industrial deafness injury compensation claims.

Nine ex-employees of the closed East Lancashire Paper Mill are said to be receiving legal advice from solicitors. They are looking at whether the conditions that they used to work could have caused the long-term damage to their hearing.

One claimant; 72-year-old Albert Isherwood worked at the paper mill from 1954 until it closed in 2001. He began work as an office boy before moving on to the engineering department where he maintained and repaired machinery.

After going to his GP complaining of a hearing problem, he was officially confirmed as having noise induced hearing loss (NIHL) after a hearing test.

Speaking of his experience at the paper mill, he said: “There was hardly a day I wasn’t exposed to the sound of massive machinery working and yet it wasn’t until the last eight or 10 years or so we were given any ear protection. Even then we would have to take it off to hear what colleagues said.”

He added: “I find it difficult to distinguish between voices and it anyone has a high pitched voice, I lose them completely.”

Mr Isherwood’s solicitor reiterated the fact that an industrial deafness compensation claim can still be made; even if you have left the company or they have ceased trading.

She said: “This is not true because, although the claim is brought against their former employer, it is the insurers of that company who would pay any compensation due.”

A fraudster who staged crashes in order to help car owners make insurance and compensation claims has only been ordered to pay back £1 of the money he scammed.

Instead, the girlfriend of jailed Mohammed Patel will bear a much larger brunt of the damage.

Ettorina Hay was ordered to pay £12,953 after it was deemed that Mr Patel did not have sufficient assets to repay the amount that he had made from car insurance policy holders.

It’s believed that Mr Patel made £46,000 from staging low-speed crashes in Manchester - £35,000 of which had gone to paying for Ms Hay’s lavish lifestyle.

Following his arrest, police found many expensive goods at the home the couple shared, including a large plasma TV, leather sofas and designer clothes. It was also shown that his antics had paid for holidays abroad and her general living costs.

Two cars registered in Ms Hay’s name were auctioned by police – a Mercedes C180 and a Lincoln Navigator for £11,416 whilst £536 was recovered from her Bolton home. She was ordered to pay the remaining £1,001 within three months.

Mr Patel, who is currently serving a four-and-a-half year prison sentence, caused crashes by braking suddenly at roundabouts when another car was following him. He used a claimant’s car, leaving them to go on to make claims for personal injury compensation, legal fees and other expenses.

A police officer from Hampshire is to make compensation claims against Southampton University Hospitals NHS Trust.

PC Miles Wilson, who had to have his leg amputated after hurting his knee, claims that if Southampton General Hospital has acted sooner his leg could have been saved.

PC Wilson claims that the hospital’s hesitancy in taking appropriate action meant that they failed to detect an artery blockage, which led to the amputation being required.

He said: “I am trying to stay positive. However, I am finding things incredibly frustrating. It is very hard to think that the need for amputation might have been avoided.”

The hospital made PC Wilson wait for an agonising five days before finally making him take an MRI scan to see what was causing the problem in his right leg. In this time a doctor told him that he could not diagnose him until test results had been received.

However, during his wait he developed a serious infection and began to suffer from hallucinations and high temperatures. He was told that he could not be seen for his MRI scan sooner due to a backlog.

When a different doctor saw him after five days, he immediately realised there was a problem and organised an emergency MRI scan. The next day he was taken for surgery, but when he woke he had had his leg amputated just above the knee.

PC Wilson’s compensation claim solicitors said: “For a young man to lose a leg is devastating but to know that the loss could have been avoided by proper care is worse. The delays were unacceptable and we will be seeking compensation.”

Arsenal football club will not be pursuing a claim for compensation for the horrific injury to teenage midfielder Aaron Ramsey on the weekend.

Ramsey had his leg broken in a brutal tackle by Stoke City’s Ryan Shawcross during Saturday evening’s fixture. He is likely to miss many months of football as a result.

However, an operation to repair his broken tibia and fibula has been described as a success by Arsenal’s chief executive Ivan Gazidis.

The incident means the third serious injury that the north London club has suffered in the last five years.

When asked if Arsenal would make a compensation claim, Mr Gazidis said: “We are not thinking about that. It’s devastating for the club, what happened. I still feel a little bit of the heart was ripped out of club.”

Shawcross was called up for the England side to play Egypt on Wednesday night but did not end up getting to play.

Although he was given an automatic 3 match ban for the red card he received, it is unlikely he will receive any further punishment after replays showed that his tackle did not intend to cause any physical harm.

England under-21 manager and former defender Stuart Pearce said: “Having worked with Ryan and having watched the incident again I am pretty sure there was no intent there to really go and do damage.”

A family who made a no win no fee compensation claim but ended up losing will not appeal the court’s decision.

The mother of Henry Webster, who was a victim of a brutal hammer attack at his school in Wiltshire, has said that she feels “exhausted” from the battle of trying to claim compensation.

A court ruled last month that despite the attack taking place on the grounds of Ridgeway School in Wroughton, that they were not liable for the injuries that Mr Webster suffered.

The judge also ordered the family to pay the school’s legal costs for defending the case, which amounted to £750,000. However, because of the no win no fee agreement with their solicitors, they were covered by after the event insurance to pay this total.

Mrs Webster said: “We have had three years of sheer hell and we’ve decided not to appeal against the decision because it’s taken too much of a toll on us personally.”

Her son was attacked by a gang of Asian youths in January 2007 following growing racial tensions at the school. He suffered a skull fracture along with numerous other injuries.

As well as his claim for personal injury compensation, his mother and father also made claims for the trauma of witnessing their son’s horrific injuries.

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) are set to launch an initiative which they hope will reduce the risk of construction site accidents.

Intensive inspections will be carried out at sites across the country, which aim to raise awareness of the dangers that cause so many injuries and deaths.

Currently the construction industry is one of the most dangerous in Britain. 2008 to 2009 saw 53 deaths and 11,264 injuries happen on construction sites.

The initiative will look at refurbishment and roofing work, with a particular focus on fall from height accidents. Inspectors will visit sites without warning to make stringent health and safety checks.

The Health and Safety Executive’s Chief Inspector of Construction Philip White said: “Every year too many construction workers are needlessly injured or killed while working on a site. While some sectors of the industry have made real improvements in recent years, we are really concerned about standards in the refurbishment sector, particularly on small projects.”

During inspections last year to 1,759 sites and 2,145 contractors, over 270 prohibition notices were issued to stop dangerous work practices.

Mr White added: “This is the third year running we have run initiatives like this and, after these latest inspections, we hope that we can report back that we have found good practice and safely operating sites.”

If you wish to make a claim for compensation for a fall at height or construction accident, contact us for more information.

Cumbria County Council has spent £600,000 over the last four years fighting numerous compensation claims for road pothole damage.

The cold weather over the winter has further worsened the problems of the already fragile Cumbrian roads, which see thousands of tourists visiting the Lake District drive over them every single year.

National campaign group the Taxpayers’ Alliance has criticised the issue, saying that more money should be spent to maintain the state of the county’s roads.

Over half of the £600,000 total was paid in injury compensation to people who had been hurt as a result of driving over a pothole.

Complaints made to Cumbria County Council have soared in recent months. In January alone, the council’s highways hotline received 865 phone calls regarding the pothole problem.

Last month also saw council chiefs set aside £3million in order to begin the process of repairing the roads.

The roads have also caused damage to vehicles, with tyre fitters reporting a huge surge in the number of repairs they are being asked to perform.

Chief executive of the Taxpayer’s Alliance Matthew Elliot said: “This is an exorbitant amount of money to spend on compensation claims and legal fees. If the council had maintained the roads properly in the first place then they could have avoided frittering away hundreds of thousands like this.”