A waste and recycling company operating in South East London has been fined £167,000 after being found guilty of multiple health and safety breaches, including the dangerous stockpiling of skips and inadequate segregation of vehicles and pedestrians. Recycling Material Supplies Limited was ordered to pay the substantial fine, along with £16,195 in costs, at Southwark Crown Court on 5 May 2026, following a prosecution by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).
Company also failed to segregate vehicles and pedestrians safely
The issues came to light during an inspection by HSE officials on 11 August 2022 at the company’s site on Ashleigh Commercial Estate, Westmoor Street. Inspectors observed a chaotic environment where various heavy vehicles, including tipper lorries and loading shovels, were driven freely across the yard. Crucially, the designated pedestrian entrance was found to be chained and padlocked, forcing all personnel, including visitors, to use the same route as the large vehicles, with no effective segregation or marked crossing points.
Further alarming observations included skips being unsafely stacked, some reaching three high. Many of these skips were visibly deformed, significantly compromising their stability and increasing the risk of collapse or falling. These precariously stacked skips were located in an area frequently accessed by workers, both on foot and in vehicles, placing them in immediate and severe danger should a collapse occur.
Health and safety legislation mandates that workplaces must be organised to ensure the safe circulation of both pedestrians and vehicles. Employers are required to implement additional precautions, especially where large vehicles need to reverse, to protect those working nearby. Although Recycling Material Supplies Limited possessed a visual traffic plan, it was neither visible to staff nor visitors and was outdated, failing to reflect the current site configuration or address critical pedestrian movements, such as access to welfare facilities.
The gravity of these concerns prompted the HSE to issue several improvement notices, requiring the company to rectify the identified breaches within a specified timeframe. A follow-up visit just 11 days later confirmed the need for urgent action. The subsequent HSE investigation also uncovered a history of enforcement action against the company, with prohibition notices having been served in 2019 for similar issues related to stockpiling and the associated risks of collapse.
Recycled Material Supplies Limited, based at Building 3, Ashleigh Commercial Estate, 87 Westmoor Street, London, ultimately failed in its duties under Section 2 and Section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. The company pleaded guilty to two offences under s33(1)(a) of the Act, acknowledging that it had put employees, agency workers, and other persons on site at a significant risk of death or serious personal injury.
Rebecca Schwartz, an HSE enforcement lawyer involved in the prosecution, highlighted the severe nature of the company’s failings. She stated that the company had endangered its workers in multiple ways, emphasising that given the considerable size and weight of the skips, the potential consequences of any collapse were “potentially catastrophic.” Ms Schwartz also pointed out the waste and recycling industry’s generally poor safety record and stressed that it was “due to sheer good fortune that nobody was seriously injured or killed” in this instance. The fact that the company had previously been made aware of its legal obligations made the case even more concerning, underscoring the HSE’s commitment to holding accountable those who fail to protect their workforce.
Originally published by the Health and Safety Executive.
