According to the Health and Safety Executive a Staffordshire kitchen fitter continues to be fined following carrying out illegal gas work and placed families’ lives in danger of being poisoned by gas fumes.
Stewart Pitt, 41, of Wombourne, Wolverhampton, was fitting kitchens for a firm as a self-employed trader. In 2011 he put three households at risk by undertaking faulty gas work.
The incidents were investigated by the Safety and health Executive (HSE), which prosecuted Mr Pitt at Stafford Magistrates’ Court.
The Magistrates’ Court was told that between 22 and 25 August 2011, Mr Pitt fitted a kitchen in the home in Wombourne. By doing this, he fitted wooden units around a boiler which created a risk when the boiler caused the units to warm up to dangerous levels. At the same property, also, he cut gas pipes when he wasn’t registered to do this. The installation was classified as ‘at risk’ when later examined by Gas Safe Register.
There’s evidence that Mr Pitt was aware that the kitchen affected the safety of the boiler, yet didn’t take measures to remedy the situation.
At a second house, he turned off then reconnected a gas hob, as he wasn’t certified to carry out such work. At a third house, also, he disconnected then reconnected a gas hob, and created a gas pipe open and uncapped, that could possibly have caused a gas leak.
HSE served a Prohibition Notice on Mr Pitt on 10 October 2012 ordering him to cease undertaking gas work until he was registered with Gas Safe Register.
Stewart Colin Pitt of Sytch Lane, Wombourne, Wolverhampton, pleaded guilty to four counts of breaching the Gas Safety (Installation and employ) Regulations 1998, and was fined £4,000 and ordered to pay for costs of £2,463.