Injury compensation news - Personal injury claims could be reduced with proposals
A stonemason has criticised Pendle Council's proposals for placing warning signs on churchyard memorials and says that they are simply a means of avoiding personal injury claims.
According to Pendle Council, 150 out of 1,500 memorials in the area are considered to be unstable and under the proposed policy could be knocked down after three days of being taped off as dangerous.
The council also proposed that family members should pay the bill for the work to be carried out.
Brent Stevenson, managing director of Brent Stevenson Memorials, believes that Pendle Council will introduce the warning signs in a bid to limit vandals contacting personal injury solicitors and making compensation claims for stones falling on top of them.
Mr Stevenson said, "Memorials do not fall on people visiting the cemetery - all this legislation is to do with abuse by vandals and it is to stop stones falling on them.
"People may have different opinions about that, and may say that if you are pushing it and damaging it then you deserve it falling on you, but in this politically correct world that's not the view the Health and Safety Executive have taken."
Councillor Davis Whipp denied that stones are being surveyed because of personal injury claims and said that a warning could prevent people suffering serious personal injuries or even from being involved in a fatal accident.
He said, "The death of a youngster in any circumstances has to be avoided."
