A CATALOGUE of errors by two companies in the run-up to a worker's death could lead to them being prosecuted by health and safety officials.

An inquest jury returned a verdict of accidental death after hearing how Robert McPhearson was crushed to death by a control panel at Cloverbrook Ltd, of Gannow Lane, Burnley, on February 17.

After the hearing in Burnley, health and safety bosses said they would be working closely with Cloverbrook and Nottingham firm Eaton Engineering, in a bid to prevent a repeat of an industrial accident -- and a prosecution could follow.

Mr McPhearson, 47, of Hyde, Cheshire, was working at the Cloverbrook factory when the control panel, weighing more than a one tonne, which was part of a drying machine, fell on him. Sitting with a jury of six women and one man, East Lancashire coroner David Smith, said the hearing was not set up to decide over negligence or who was to blame. The inquest heard how Mr McPhearson had been sub-contracted by Eaton to install a drying machine which had been brought from Scotland.

The jury heard:

Neither firm had carried out a risk assessment before the task was performed

Mr McPhearson and his colleague, Andrew Reddish, could not use a fork lift truck to move the object due to restricted space in the factory. The two jacks hired by Eaton to move the object were of different types which moved at different speeds and could have resulted in Mr McPhearson's death

There was a slight slope of the factory floor leading in the direction in which the control panel fell

Cloverbrook had already been advised to carry out risk assessments on 'special projects' after being caught out on a previous occasion by the HSE.

Mr Reddish joined Eaton five months earlier but did not receive any health and safety training until three weeks after the accident -- when he was given leaflets.

Mr Reddish said: "At the time we were working on the day of the accident there was insufficient room to get the forklift truck in but if there had been enough room that would have been the easiest way to move it."

But Mike Bartle, special projects director at Cloverbrook denied there was insufficient space to operate a forklift truck at the time and told the inquest he did not request a risk assessment from Eaton because he had worked with the company before.

He said: "We gave the contract to people who had done the job before and who I had great faith in and I invited them to visit the site."

Mr Bartle said he did take safety measures to protect his own employees, including putting tape around the area where Mr McPhearson was working to restrict access and removing all machinery out of the way.

Graham Gent, project manager at Eaton Engineering told the inquest they would have done a risk assessment if they had been asked, but did not feel it was necessary as they had moved a similar dryer from Nottingham to Northern Ireland 12 months earlier and that he was familiar with the Cloverbrook premises.

James Corbridge, a specialist inspector from the health and safety executive, told the inquest that on inspecting the premises after the incident, he found the mechanical jack to be one inch higher off the ground than the hydraulic one and said that fact, plus the sloping ground, could have caused the control panel to fall over.

Roger Jamson from the health and safety executive told the inquest that it should have been Eaton Engineering's duty to carry out a risk assessment under the Health and Safety at Work Act.

After the verdict was given he said Health and Safety officials would be the possibility of any criminal prosecution.

He said: "We will be in constant touch with both companies to look at ways of how anything like this could be prevented from happening again in the future."

Mr McPhearson's family were too upset to comment. Mr Gent said he did not want to comment. Nobody from Cloverbrook was available to comment.