Day 127 - 23 May 95 - Page 60


     
     1
     2   Q.   How long are accident books kept for?
     3        A.  Legally they have to be kept for three years.
     4
     5   Q.   If you look at the front of those it says: "Record of
     6        accidents, dangerous occurrences, ill-health enquiries.
     7        This record must be kept available for inspection by HM
     8        Inspectors of Health and Safety.  An entry made in the
     9        record must be kept for at least three years from the date
    10        on which it was made."   Do you know in general what the
    11        practice of the restaurants is, if there is a general
    12        practice, on the expiry of the three years so far as these
    13        books are concerned?
    14        A.  In my experience, most restaurants you go into you find
    15        that they have the books going back several years.
    16
    17   MR. JUSTICE BELL:  Are they bound books or loose-leaf folders?
    18        A.  They come bound stapled.  That I think is an incident
    19        report book.
    20
    21   Q.   The only reason I ask is, you see, this starts on 20th
    22        September 1984 and it finishes, as Mr. Rampton, said in
    23        December 1992.  If it is bound that means, unless people
    24        start tearing sheets out and throwing them away, that it is
    25        going kept until the end of 1995, by which time the first
    26        accident in the book has had a record retained of it for 11
    27        and a quarter years?
    28        A.  Yes.
    29
    30   Q.   So, depending where you come in the book, it might well be
    31        that there will be some record of an accident going back
    32        that sort of measure of time?
    33        A.  A long time, yes.  They are bound together so they
    34        cannot pull any pages out.  They are stapled down the
    35        middle.  They are HMSO publications.  They are standard
    36        books.
    37
    38   MR. RAMPTON:  Each page is headed, "Health and Safety Executive"
    39        with a sort of symbol or logo on the left-hand corner?
    40        A.  Yes.
    41
    42   Q.   Can I ask you one more thing about this while I have it
    43        out?  I have noticed from reading these pages that there is
    44        a lady who is known, my Lord, as Gloria Sall whose first
    45        recorded accident was on 27th April 1985 when she was a
    46        crew member, and whose last recorded accident was on 10th
    47        December 1992 by which time she was a Floor Manager.  In
    48        the interim she had suffered 19 different misfortunes, none
    49        of them seriously, over that period from 1985 to 1987,
    50        roughly speaking.  Does that strike you as in any way 
    51        unusual or does it give you concern or anxiety? 
    52        A.  I would suspect that she was just very diligent about 
    53        writing up her accidents in the accident book.
    54
    55   Q.   They write them in themselves, do they?
    56        A.  They usually do, yes, but the rule on accident books is
    57        they are left in an accessible place to the crew so that
    58        they can put in their own accidents; that they advise the
    59        managers they have had an accident but they put it in
    60        themselves.

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