What happened
Wirral Council has been fined £6,000 after an employee suffered serious injuries when a stepladder collapsed beneath him, according to the HSE Media Centre (read the full release here).
The worker was attempting to access a loft space at the Council-operated Dale Farm site in Heswall, Wirral. As he neared the top of the stepladder, it gave way and he fell to the ground, fracturing his collarbone and breaking ribs.
An HSE investigation found the Council had failed to adequately control the risks of working at height and the use of ladders. Crucially, the source reports that ladders stored outside were in poor condition and remained accessible to any employee who wanted to use them — even though some had already been identified as unsafe. Employees had not been trained on how to assess a ladder as safe to use.
HSE Inspector Mike Lisle said: "This worker suffered painful and life-changing injuries in a fall that could have been prevented." He added that "employees had not received suitable training and ladders were not being systematically inspected to ensure they were safe."
Wirral MBC pleaded guilty to breaching Section 2(1) of the Health and Safety at Work etc Act 1974. The Council was fined £6,000 and ordered to pay £4,000 in costs at Warrington Magistrates' Court on 11th August 2026.
Why it matters to contractors
Falls from height remain the leading cause of workplace death and injury — the HSE flags this again in the release. And this case is a reminder that the killer isn't always a scaffold three storeys up. A stepladder into a loft did serious, life-changing damage.
Two failures stand out, and both are entirely fixable. First, unsafe kit stayed in circulation. Someone had already spotted that ladders weren't in a good state of repair, yet they weren't quarantined or scrapped. Second, nobody had been trained to check a ladder before climbing it. A quick pre-use check would very likely have caught a stepladder that was one climb away from collapse.
That's the whole lesson: a defect spotted but not acted on, and a workforce not equipped to make the last-line check themselves. It's cheap to fix and expensive to ignore.
What to check on your site
- Pre-use checks are happening, every time. Feet, stiles, rungs, locking mechanisms and the platform — a quick visual and physical check before each use, not just at formal inspection.
- Damaged ladders are removed, not left leaning against a wall. Tag it, quarantine it, destroy it. "Unsafe but still there" is exactly what caught this council out.
- A ladder and stepladder register exists so periodic inspections are recorded and traceable, not left to memory.
- Workers are trained to assess a ladder. They should know what a defect looks like and have the authority to reject kit.
- Storage isn't wrecking your equipment. Ladders stored outside in the weather degrade — check how and where yours live.
- There's a proper risk assessment for the specific task, including loft and roof-void access, not a generic one filed away.
HSE guidance produced with the Ladder Association (LA455) and its Working at Height brief guide set out the practical steps — worth having open when you review your arrangements.
Which SafetyPod documents help
Getting your paperwork in order won't climb the ladder for you, but it does give you a system to spot and stop the failures that caught this council out.
- A task-specific working at height / ladder risk assessment puts the hazards and controls in writing for the actual job.
- The Site Monitoring Bundle includes inspection forms to keep equipment checks systematic and recorded.
- A ladder and equipment register gives you the audit trail that shows unsafe kit was actually taken out of use.
- Trades who live on access equipment should look at the Roofer Pack or Scaffolder Pack, both built around working at height.
Every template is editable and drafted to current UK legislation, so you can tailor it to your own tasks and sites.
The bottom line
A £6,000 fine, £4,000 costs, and a worker with broken ribs and a fractured collarbone — all from a stepladder that should have been binned and a check that was never taught. Sort your ladder register, train your team on pre-use checks, and get the unsafe kit off site today. Browse the full document library to get started.