A golf club has been forced to payout more than £10,000 after a member of staff suffered burns from an explosion.

Kingsgate Golf Club, the company which runs North Foreland Golf Club in Broadstairs, has been prosecuted for failing to ensure the health, safety and welfare of it employees.

It comes after officers from Thanet District Council investigated the incident in which a man was injured while working at the club.

A decision was made to bring two sets of charges against Kingsgate Golf Club.

The first - under the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 - was for failing to ensure, so far as reasonably practicable, the health, safety and welfare at work of employees.

The second was under the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002, for not being able to provide details of substances hazardous to health, to which an employee was liable to be exposed.

On Friday, November 23 at a trial at Margate Magistrates’ Court, representatives from Kingsgate Golf Club Ltd pleaded guilty to both charges.

They were ordered to pay a total of of £10,873.21. This includes a fine of £3,300, £7,373.21 costs and a £170 victim surcharge.

Cllr Lesley Ann Game, cabinet member for housing and safer neighbourhoods, commented: "All employers have a duty to protect the health, safety and welfare of their employees and need to take reasonable steps to do so.

"No one should have to be exposed to unnecessary danger at work. While prosecution is not something we undertake lightly, in a case as serious as this one, it was deemed necessary.

"This case highlights the importance of ensuring the health and safety of employees at all times and the very serious consequences of non compliance."

The council’s public protection team receives about 100 Riddor (reporting of injuries, diseases and dangerous occurrences regulations) reports each year, as well as investigating about 30 health and safety complaints annually.