Leeds railway station staff 'fail to help' fall woman

[whole diary]

[grahame]

On another tack, a very interesting story in that it's a report by a bystander (a commuter named in the article) to the BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page).  I'm not clear if it came to Network Rail or Northern Rail's attention at all until, perhaps, the BBC asked for a comment.  All seems flimsy; not sure if anyone even knows who the woman was - it's not inconceivable that she felt it so minor she just carried on; perhaps it just looked bad from certain angles?   I'm reading a bit of a potential non-story here.  Perhaps nothing of interest was happening in Leeds that day?

[ChrisB]

Whilst it's unlikely that a first aider would be prosecuted if they further injured someone they had gone to assist, negligent action on their part could still be deemed illegal. Or if not criminally negligent then the negligent action could give rise to a civil claim.

You talk negligence. Even if trained, negligence is always prosecutable - what if track workers, fully trained were negligent & left bolts off a set of points (Hatfield, was it?).....

[TaplowGreen]

........notwithstanding debates about Primary legislation, legality, elf n safety, insurance, "people handling training" arguing over NR^» (Network Rail - home page)/TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company) responsibility etc there is such a thing as compassion for a fellow human being who is injured or distressed, which I would hope would trump all of the above..........

.....I have a vision of a crowd of people in high vis jackets and hats all standing around the "fallen woman" (so to speak!), arguing, scratching their chins and trying to decide who should do something whilst she sits/lies there in pain..........Monty Python used to do sketches about this sort of thing!

I'd like to think that if it was me I would act first to help the person and worry about the implications (if any) later?

[grahame]

Further Press coverage - Daily Mail

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2750000/Rail-staff-wouldn-t-help-elderly-woman-fell-escalator-Leeds-station-hadn-t-trained-people-handling.html

Tom Lees, 25, said he was waiting for a train at around 10.30am when he spotted an ^old lady fall backwards^ while travelling up an escalator.

He said one passenger ^grabbed her^ and another stopped the escalator by pressing an emergency button. ^A third called the Northern Rail staff to help but they just stood there like lemons,^ he said.
 
Mr Lees, a scientist working in the road industry, added: ^I dashed up the escalator ^ she was in a very precarious position. Afterwards I asked [the staff] why they didn^t help and they said they weren^t allowed to because they weren^t ^people-handling trained^.

^I said it was shameful behaviour.^ Northern Rail runs passenger trains across the north of England and is the largest train operator in the UK^▸ (United Kingdom). This week it introduced peak evening fares ^ meaning some weekday tickets will cost 117 per cent more.

[article continues]

[ChrisB]

more pertinantly, it goes on....

But John Rowe, head of operations for the Health and Safety Executive in Yorkshire and the Humber, said it was a ^ridiculous^ situation, adding: ^There nothing in the Health and Safety at Work Act that prevents people offering assistance to others in distress.

^I can only think that either the company^s own policies are being stretched and misinterpreted by their employees, or the individuals in question didn^t fancy getting involved and they just used health and safety as a convenient excuse.^

[phile]

People making up their own Health and Safety Rules again !!!

[bobm]

There are two sets of rules used as a smoke screen by those wishing to avoid doing something in my experience.  One is Health & Safety, the other is the Data Protection Act.

[stuving]

There are countries in which this could be a matter for the criminal law, notably France and Germany. In France the offence is usually called "non-assistance to a person in danger". I think it comes about if you sit down to write a complete penal code, instead of relying on common law and individual statutes.

In the French case I can show you the text of the code p^nale, in the official translation:

ARTICLE 223-6
(Ordinance No. 2000-916 of 19 September 2000 Article 3 Official Journal of 22 September into force 1 January 2002)
 Anyone who, being able to prevent by immediate action a felony or a misdemeanour against the bodily integrity of a
person, without risk to himself or to third parties, wilfully abstains from doing so, is punished by five years' imprisonment
and a fine of ^75,000.
 The same penalties apply to anyone who wilfully fails to offer assistance to a person in danger which he could
himself provide without risk to himself or to third parties, or by initiating rescue operations.

There is a related "good Samaritan" exemption to prosecution for illegal acts performed in such cases "for the greater good":

[/b]ARTICLE 122-7
 A person is not criminally liable if confronted with a present or imminent danger to himself, another person or
property, he performs an act necessary to ensure the safety of the person or property, except where the means used
are disproportionate to the seriousness of the threat

PS: I note that the relevant sentence does not make sense. I would re-translate it as:

The same penalties apply to anyone who wilfully fails to offer assistance to a person in danger, which he could
provide without risk to himself or to third parties, either by his own actions or by initiating rescue operations.

So far as I can find out, the offence is rarely prosecuted, but is kept in reserve for particularly blatant cases. It should perhaps be seen a more of an official indication of how people ought to behave.

Now I wonder, who thinks we should have a similar provision?

[TaplowGreen]

It's pretty sad when a country has to legislate to cover what should be normal human nature to help another person in distress..............but I guess that's the society we've created for ourselves?

[phile]

Principally created by the Jobsworths.