AN East Yorkshire manufacturing company was fined £5,000 after an employee fell from a platform and broke his arm, leg and hip.

Holmes Catering Equipment Ltd, of Full Sutton Industrial Estate, admitted contravening the Health and Safety at Work Act by failing to ensure the safety of Angus MacGregor, 37, of Vivis Road, Pickering.

Mr MacGregor, a semi-skilled fabricator, fell three metres from a platform raised on a fork-lift truck while painting a part of the building in September last year.

David Stewart, an inspector for the Health and Safety Executive, told Pocklington Magistrates Court the company had borrowed the platform, in the form of a cage, from a neighbouring company.

But it did not fit its own fork-lift truck, and was wedged on without being secured by metal sleeves and bolts. Mr MacGregor, who sometimes performed routine maintenance tasks around the building, was asked to paint a section of galvanised steel five metres above a gravel car park.

Mr Stewart said: "Mr MacGregor asked his colleague, Mr Frost, to edge forward closer to the building, but the wheels started to spin and the platform was shaken off the forks and fell to the ground. Mr MacGregor fell approximately three metres and suffered serious injuries.

"Luckily the cage fell to the side."

Joseph Capaldi, defending, said the managing director of the company, Anthony Lawson, and the chairman, who were both in court, deeply regretted the accident.

The company was fined £5,000 with £809 costs.

Updated: 11:23 Thursday, January 25, 2001