School caretaker disabled in fall days before retirement
A caretaker has been left with life-changing injuries after he fell four metres through a roof at a school in Bradford five days before his retirement.
David O’Hanlon, 62, had worked at Beckfoot School in Bingley for eight years but decided to take early retirement when the site was closed and replaced by a new facility. He agreed to stay on to supervise the clearance of the old building and to ensure all classrooms were empty.€
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School caretaker disabled in fall days before retirement
A caretaker has been left with life-changing injuries after he fell four metres through a roof at a school in Bradford five days before his retirement.
Safety & Health Practitioner
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Its interesting that there have been a number of reports of the older generation being injured at work recently. Is this to be a rising trend in light of us all having to work longer?
another so called “low risk” environment
To be fair the council probably did have risk assessments for the day-to-day activities of a caretaker. However, accessing a ceiling void would not be considered a day-to-day activity for a caretaker or even a Site Manager. Is the fact that he only had 8 years service and was taking early retirement relevant?? Some cynics might think he was boosting his pension -although that sounds extreme but not unheard of in todays society!
Stevie – I only pointed out some of the details that were reported in the story. ie. only worked at the school for 8 years and decided to take early retirement, I suspect somewhat forced retirement by the appearance of the new facility.
I was then suggesting that with these details there may be some thoughts of a self inflicted ‘accident’ without appreciating the potential injuries that could occur – As I said before, it wouldn’t be unheard of.
Paul – I agree that their is a possibility that he was working outside his scope of employment, but are you seriously suggesting that he injured himself deliberately for financial gain. Obviously there is no doubt that false claims happen and are driven by ambulance chasing rainmakers, but do you really think that someone would self inflict such serious injury in order to bring a civil action. I must be naive, i thought that was for the likes of uncle Albert and Del Boy
If Bradford Council had requested Mr. O’Hanlon to provide a light in the roof void then they would be entirely at fault and deserved of punishment but chances are he decided to “help” the clearance process and went ahead to replace the bulb. As there were no electrical installations involved the facility was available and he had probably been up there a number of times over the years without incident as it seemed to be a good storage space. To blame the Council entirely is not fair.