A FATHER-OF-TWO who burned his bare bottom in a sauna while on holiday at Pine Lake has been awarded £1,000 compensation.

Andrew Prout, 37, a BT manager, was naked while mopping out his family's sauna at their chalet in the holiday complex near Carnforth.

After he finished cleaning the floor, he stood up and burned his backside on a tin box holding the red hot coals which was fixed to the wall.

Mr Prout, of Ackworth, near Pontefract, West Yorkshire, said he had to drive 15 miles to hospital sitting on wet towels.

"I didn't realise how serious it was," he said. "It just felt like I had been cut on my bottom. But after a while it was excruciating and in the end I was told I had second degree burns."

Mr Prout was holidaying at Pine Lake with his wife Kerry and their two children Megan, five, and two-year-old Natasha when the incident took place in December 1998.

His main concern after he suffered his injuries was that it would have been worse if it had happened to a child in the 6ft square sauna.

An out-of-court settlement of £1,000 was eventually reached, which Mr Prout said the family will use for Christmas. "I can see the funny side of it now," he said.

"But I was in pain for two weeks and had scars for six weeks." His solicitor, Melanie Farran, of Russell, Jones and Walker in Leeds, said: "We argued that the company hadn't taken enough care to fix a guard round the sauna or even to put up a warning notice to people to beware of the hot box fitting in the sauna."

The health and safety spokeswoman at Pine Lake Resort was unavailable for comment.