The Health & Safety Executive (HSE) carried out several inspections on Warmsworth Stone Limited, which produces carved stone masonry products using limestone, sandstone, granite and marble, at the company’s Knabs Hill Farm site in Thurnscoe, South Yorkshire starting in May 2023.

Following these inspections, the company was served with seven improvement notices covering several failures, including stone dust exposure, legionella bacteria control and inadequate welfare facilities.

When HSE inspectors returned in September 2023, five of the improvement notices had still not been complied with – despite the company being given an extension to do so following another visit in August.

The HSE said that Warmsworth Stone had shown “reckless disregard” of several health and safety issues, including the assessment and control of respirable dust.

The company’s health and safety management standard was far below what is required by health and safety law, leading to the HSE’s prosecution for failure to control workers' exposure to RCS.

Warmsworth Stone Limited of 1-3 Sheffield Road, Warmsworth, Doncaster pleaded guilty to breaching section 21 of Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 by failing to comply with an Improvement Notice, breaching Regulation 7(1) of the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 by failing to adequately control employee exposure to a substance hazardous to health namely RCS and breaching Regulation 9(2)(a) the same Regulations by failing to have local exhaust ventilation subject to a thorough examination and test at least every 14 months.

It was fined £18,000 and ordered to pay costs of £4,064.

Director Simon Jonathan Frith pleaded guilty to being a director of a company that had breached Regulation 7(1) of the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002 by failing to adequately control employee exposure to a substance hazardous to health, namely RCS and breaching Regulation 9(2)(a) of the same Regulations by failing to have local exhaust ventilation subject to a thorough examination and test at least every 14 months, those offences being committed with his consent, connivance or neglect.

He was fined £1,062 and ordered to pay costs of £3,782.