A recycling firm has been fined after a worker was injured during a fall at work.

The unnamed man was working for European Metal Recycling on Beevor Street in Warrington when the incident occurred in December 2007.

He had been attempting to move some refrigerator units and was standing on top of one of them in a curtain-sided trailer.

However, he overbalanced and fell ten feet to the floor, dislocating several fingers, breaking a wrist and fracturing a vertebra in his neck.

European Metal Recycling admitted to breaches of the Work at Height Regulations 2005 and was ordered to pay £2,500, as well as £2,454.

Health and Safety Executive inspector Judith McNulty-Green said that 3,000 people were injured after falling from height in the workplace in 2007.

"All companies must assess the risks from work they are undertaking at height and ensure that the work is planned properly and appropriate measures are taken so that workers are not at risk of falling," she added.

Under the Work at Height Regulations 2005, every employer should make sure that work is not carried out at height when it can be successfully carried out at ground level.

Where work at height is carried out, employers are legally obliged to take adequate steps to prevent falls.