A JOINERY company has been fined £300,000 after a window fitter was knocked out when a set of patio doors fell from a lorry and hit him on the back of head.

Michael Jephcott fell unconscious for ‘several minutes’ and suffered whiplash after the incident happened on a Linden Homes site in Chosley near Wallingford on October 17, 2013.

Munster Joinery Ltd, which has a UK base in Warwickshire, admitted a charge of failure to discharge a duty under section three of the Health and Safety Work Act 1974 at Oxford Crown Court.

The court heard yesterday how there was a ‘systemic management floor’ of implementing health and safety systems.

Mr Jephcott was injured after the patio doors fell when he and two others were unloading them manually, when ‘mechanical means’ could've been used.

Judge Peter Ross said it was fortunate Mr Jephcott was wearing a hard hat, because if he hadn’t he would have ‘undoubtedly’ suffered very serious injury or death. He added it appeared the company had a ‘culture’ of ‘not learning lessons’ from previous incidents.

Defending, Jamas Hodivala said: “This is not about the company failing to have in place systems. It’s the fact that there were departures from the systems that the company had in place. The company accepts that more could and should have been done to implement these systems.”