Summary
MM Flowers Limited has been fined £134,000 after an employee, Andy Hazelden, suffered a life-changing injury at its Huntingdon facility in February 2023. While unloading cargo ahead of Valentine’s Day, Mr Hazelden attempted to free a stuck skid. During the process, he stepped into an unidentified 10cm gap in a roller deck; the cargo then shifted, striking and trapping his leg. The 60-year-old subsequently underwent a through-knee amputation. At Peterborough Magistrates’ Court in April 2026, the company pleaded guilty to breaching the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 and was ordered to pay costs of £4,908 in addition to the fine.
Analysis
The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation reveals a dual failure in both physical infrastructure and operational procedure. Firstly, the presence of an “unprotected gap” in the roller deck suggests a lack of thorough workplace inspections and equipment maintenance. Secondly, the company lacked a safe system of work for handling obstructions; rather than having a mechanical or formalised protocol for clearing blockages, employees were expected to physically intervene, exposing them to the kinetic energy of heavy, unstable loads.
The case underscores the principle that “everyday work activities” often harbour the greatest risks if they are not properly assessed. The severity of the fine and the permanent nature of the injury highlight the high cost of neglecting basic safety guidance, such as ensuring that pedestrian areas are free of traps and that manual intervention with moving machinery is strictly controlled or eliminated.
Article Link: “At one point I was genuinely terrified I was going to bleed out and die” – HSE Media Centre