The Offices, shops and railway premises Act, 1963 / With introduction and annotations by Ian Fife and E. Anthony Machin. Being a reprint of Butterworths Annotated Legislative Service, Statutes Supplement no. 138.

  • United Kingdom
Date:
1963
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The Offices, shops and railway premises Act, 1963 / With introduction and annotations by Ian Fife and E. Anthony Machin. Being a reprint of Butterworths Annotated Legislative Service, Statutes Supplement no. 138. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    42/132 (page 24)
    No. 138.—OFFICES, SHOPS AND RAILWAY PREMISES. ACT 1963 (5) The foregoing provisions of this section shall not apply to any such part of any fuel storage premises as is in the open, but in relation to any such part the following provisions shall have effect, namely,— (a) the surface of the ground shall be kept in good repair; (b) all steps and platforms shall be of sound construction and properly maintained; (c) all openings in platforms shall be securely fenced, except in so far as the nature of the work renders such fencing impracticable. NOTES General effect of section. Sub-s. (1) imposes duties designed to secure the safety of floors, stairs, steps, passages and gangways in premises within the Act. Sub-s. (2) requires the provision of hand-rails or hand-holds on staircases, and sub-s. (3) provides for the guarding of open staircases. By sub-s. (4), openings in floors must be securely fenced. Sub-s. (5) substitutes special provisions for the foregoing in the case of fuel storage premises. This section may be compared with the similar provisions relating to factories con- tained in s. 28 of the Factories Act 1961 (41 Halsbury’s Statutes (2nd Edn.) 271 and Redgrave’s Factories Acts (zoth Edn.) pp. 85 ef seq.). Sub-s. (1): Floors ...gangways. These terms are not defined in the Act, and “‘where words are . . . perfectly familiar all one can do is to say whether or not one regards them as apt to cover or describe the circumstances in question in any particular case”’ (per Somervell, L.J., in Bath v. British Transport Commission, [1954] 2 All E.R. 542, C.A.). Thus, in relation to the cognate provisions of the Factories Act 1961, a plank across a duct may be a “‘gangway” (Hosking v. De Havilland Aircraft Co., Ltd., [1949] 1 All E.R. 540), but ‘“‘mother earth”’ has been held not to be a “‘ floor’, ‘“‘passage’”’ or “‘gangway”’ (Newberry v. Joseph Westwood & Co., Lid., [1960] 2 Lloyd’s Rep. 37). In Tate v. Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson, Ltd., [1958] 1 All E.R. 150, C.A., Lord Den- ning (at p. 152) said that the ordinary and natural meaning of a floor is something within walls, indoors, on which people walk or stand. In this case the Court of Appeal held that a staging of planks on a crane gantry, the purpose of which was to allow workmen to get from one part of the gantry to another, was not a “‘floor’’ within s. 25 (3) of the Factories Act 1937 (9 Halsbury’s Statutes (2nd Edn.) 1018) (now s. 28 (4) of the Factories Act 1961). With this case may be compared Morris v. P.L.A. (1950), 84 Lloyd, L.R. 564 (floor of gantry held to be within the section) ; Taylor v. R. and H. Green and Silley Weir, Ltd. (1950), 84 Lloyd, L.R. 570 (affirmed by the C.A. (1951), 1 Lloyd, L.R. 345) (soil around inside of dry dock held to be a floor) and Harrison v. Metro- politan Vickers Electrical Co., Ltd., [1954] 1 All E.R. 404 (sand bed of foundry held to be a floor). Of sound construction and properly maintained. It is submitted that these words should receive the same interpretation as in s. 28 (1) of the Factories Act 1961. There, it has been held that the duty flowing from the use of these words is absolute and applies primarily to the structural condition of floors, etc., but it may also apply to something put upon a floor, if it can be regarded as part of the floor although not incorporated in it (Latimer v. A.E.C., Lid., [1953] A.C. 643). Where, therefore, a floor, etc., is in some transient and exceptional condition, or there is temporarily something upon it which gives rise to danger there has been no breach of this obligation if the floor, etc., is otherwise sound. In determining whether a floor is ‘‘of sound construction and properly maintained’’ regard must be had to the purpose for which it is intended to be used (Mayne v. Johnstone and Cumbers, Ltd., [1947] 2 All E.R. 159). In each case the criterion is safety, which is a question of degree dependent upon the particular facts (Payne v. Weldless Steel Tube Co., Lid., [1956] 3 All E.R. 612; [1956] 1 Q.B. 656, CA: Reasonably practicable. See the note to s. 6 (3), ante. In Braham v. J. Lyons & Co., Lid., [1962] 3 All E.R. 281, C.A., Lord Denning, M.R., said obiter (at p. 283) that the effect of the qualification ‘‘so far as is reasonably practicable’ was that all reasonable measures must be taken to keep the floor free from slippery substances, and that the employer is liable for a failure both on the part of his servants and on the part of his independent contractors. Donovan, L.J. (at p. 284), thought that a momen- tary lapse on the part of a minor employee would enable the employer to be acquitted of an offence under s. 25 (1) of the Factories Act 1937 (9 Halsbury’s Statutes (znd Edn.) 1017) (now s. 28 (1) of the Factories Act 1961), by virtue of the provisions of Ss. 137 of the Factories Act 1937 (9 Halsbury’s Statutes (2nd Edn.) 1107), but he expressed no view upon the effect of such a lapse in the context of civil liability. Obstruction. In Drummond v. Harland Engineering Co., 1963 S.L.T. 115, the Outer House of the Court of Session, construing s. 25 (1) of the Factories Act 1937 (9 Halsbury’s Statutes (2nd Edn.) 1017) (now s. 28 (1) of the Factories Act 1961), held that a vertical angle iron projecting half an inch above the floor of a foundry and situated at the corner of a plate supporting a moulding machine was not an ‘‘obstruc- tion’”’ but was part of a machine which was a fixture on the premises. An obstruction,