£50,000 fine for budget store chain over 'death trap' shop

A fire safety inspector uncovered a catalogue of failings inside the Poundstretcher store on Carlton Street in October 2009 that put lives at risk, Leeds Crown Court heard yesterday.

Only one fire escape out of a possible six was available for the public or staff to use and large amounts of combustible material were found on the way to the exits.

People could have got out by using a fire door into the stairwell, but that would have locked behind them and then they might have been unable to get through the next fire door, trapping them inside.

"They would be effectively in a tin of beans because of the heat and the smoke that would have been able to generate through the stairwell," said Toni Wharton, prosecuting.

The Poundstretcher store is large enough to hold 300 people on the ground floor, 100 on the first floor and 20 members of staff – a total of 420 people.

"The breaches put a significant number of people at risk of serious injury or death," Mrs Wharton said. "In reality, there would be less than this figure of people within the store but there was potential for the risk of serious injury."

A risk assessment was carried out of the store before the fire safety inspector visited, which was supposed to ensure escape routes were clear from debris and changes in floor numbers were clearly identified.

But this was "not properly reviewed" and staff were unable to locate the risk assessment when asked to present it by the fire safety inspector, Mrs Wharton added.

The manager of the store – who had only been in the job for two months – was unaware of many of the fire exit routes.

Poundstretcher, which has more than 300 outlets in the country, has been fined more than 20,000 for five safety offences in two prosecutions over the last 18 months.

It was fined 8,500 for two offences at Wakefield Magistrates' Court in September 2009, and received a 12,000 fine for three offences at Halifax Magistrates' Court in July 2009.

Poundstretcher has not made a trading profit since February 2005, but the safety breaches were not representative of how the company usually operates, said Tahir Khan, defending.

"The company complied fully with the investigation and entered guilty pleas at the first opportunity," he said.

"When these failings were brought, it acted immediately to put right what it had got wrong. All three offences occurred close together but are not representative of how the company usually behaves."

Poundstretcher Ltd pleaded guilty to seven charges of breaching fire safety regulations, which included offences relating to general fire precautions, a risk assessment review, emergency routes and exits and training.

Sentencing the company, Judge Jonathan Rose said: "There were six fire escape routes in the store but only one of them was available to members of the public and employees.

"This may have been a death trap for everybody who was in that store – and it's that sort of assessment of this store that makes it necessary to impose a very significant financial penalty."

The company was fined a total of 51,500 for all seven offences and ordered to pay court costs of 3,449.75.

Martin Collinson, company secretary of Poundstretcher, said after the sentencing: "We note the comments of the judge and we have to take what he said very seriously."