Building firm pays €5k to poor box for safety breaches

A Kerry construction company, involved in school and other public building contracts, has paid €5,000 into the court poor box to avoid a conviction for breach of health and safety legislation after it pleaded guilty to failing to properly fence off a site during the building of an extension at a secondary school in Killarney, Co Kerry last year.

Numerous children were in the vicinity of the site in the grounds of Killarney Community College when a Health and Safety Authority inspector paid “a routine visit” at around 11am on February 25, 2016, when school was in progress, Killarney District Court heard earlier this month.

The prosecution against Evans and Kelliher Construction Ltd, of Chestnut Grove Apartments, Sprout Lane, Milltown, Co Kerry, was brought at the suit of the DPP.

Nobody was injured, “but without a doubt” there was potential for injury, given that classes were on-going, Michael Flynn, HSA inspector, said in evidence.

The main gate into the site from inside was “unlocked and unattended” and pupils could gain access, Mr Flynn outlined. A section of the fencing had been moved such that an emergency door was blocked — and people would have been directed into the middle of the hazardous building site.

Another section of the fencing had not been secured.

Eoin Brosnan, solicitor, had told the court his client was a commercial company involved in school crèches and HSE work.

The company had no previous conviction.

It remedied the situation in Killarney at once; a subsequent health and safety audit at work it was undertaking in Tuosist NS shortly afterwards showed an almost 100% compliance rate.

Yesterday, Mr Brosnan told the court the money had been paid to the court service and Judge James O’Connor struck out the matter.