Site of boy’s death in Glasgow ‘should have been checked for safety’ | Glasgow

A senior official at a construction site where a 10-year-old boy died after falling into a maintenance hole has admitted “we should have checked” whether it was safe, an inquest into a fatal accident heard on Tuesday.

Shea Ryan died on July 16, 2020 when he climbed through an unsecured fence at a building site in Drumchapel, Glasgow, and fell 20 feet down a shaft.

Stuart Laurence, the deputy location officer, said staff should have checked that the MH22 maintenance hole was secure when his company took over responsibility for it in early July 2020.

MH22 was part of the site’s Garscadden Burn Area (GBA), which was managed by a company called ABV until 3 July 2020. RJ McLeod, who was responsible for drainage works on the remainder of the site, took over responsibility for it.

A central question in the investigation was how Shea gained access to the unfinished maintenance hole where he lost his life.

Laurence told the judge at Glasgow Crown Court that he first saw MH22 after it was taken over by the GBA on 3 July: “I know there was no layer of building blocks on it, so I know from that it was not finished.”

Laurence added that it would have been “clear at a glance” whether a maintenance hole had been completed or not.

The structural engineer explained that an “unfinished” version would be covered with a concrete structure with a cast iron lid, which would weigh about 80 kg.

The lid, he said, would have to be carried by “two men,” but “an adult might be able to push it.”

Laurence added that he “wouldn’t think” a 10-year-old could move it.

When asked if a risk assessment had been carried out for MH22 after the takeover, Laurence replied: “There was no risk assessment for the maintenance gap because we didn’t build it.”

When asked if there should have been one, he replied, “In retrospect, yes.”

A July 6 risk assessment into GBA found there was a risk of harm to the public from a maintenance leak, but Laurence said this was not related to MH22, which he said was not part of RJ McLeod’s remit.

He said the only risk assessment for MH22 would have been to check that the lid was properly secured.

Laurence said that when he first saw it from 10 metres away, he could see that “industrial standard materials” had been used and he “understood the metal lid was heavy enough (that) it was safe”.

However, he said that as far as he knew, no one had checked that everything was properly secured and that no formal risk assessment had been carried out or recorded anywhere.

Laurence said: “If we had taken it over from another location we would have had to check more formally that it was complete than we did – or at least I did.”

When asked if the maintenance hole had been opened at any time between July 3 and the accident, Laurence replied that RJ McLeod personnel had no reason to open the hole and that he did not know if anyone had done so.

The investigation also heard evidence from Robert Van Beek, RJ McLeod’s contracts manager at the time of the incident.

The investigation found that five cases of unauthorized access to GBA had been reported prior to the takeover. These cases were reported to the police, but RJ McLeod was not aware of them.

Fencing was damaged, youths climbed onto construction site machinery and played with tools, and a security guard was attacked.

David Swanney, who represented Shea’s mother, Joanne Ferguson, reminded Van Beek that RJ McLeod had taken extra security measures following Shea’s death.

Swanney asked Van Beek: “If you had been aware of the unauthorized access incidents between April and June 2020, would you have implemented those measures before you took over the site on July 3?”

Van Beek, 62, replied that if they had known about the incidents, they would have deployed a “more active form of security”, including CCTV cameras and additional fences, because the GBA would have been considered “high risk”.

The investigation is still ongoing.