Family of apprentice who died in industrial accident to mark Workers' Memorial Day with video message

Jason Burden, from South Shields, was in the final year of his marine engineer apprenticeship when a piece of shipping machinery fell on him at Sunderland’s South Docks in December 2011.

An inquest into the death of the 19-year-old former Brinkburn School student heard the heavy section he had been working had not been secured with wooden chocks.

Today, his family joined others across the world in marking International Workers’ Memorial Day, where the trade union movement remembers those who have lost their lives at work or from work-related injury or diseases and calls for measures to prevent further fatalities.

His dad Trevor and mum Maria, both 51, have previously attended a memorial service held each year in Hartlepool organised by unions, where they join other families and representatives to lay wreaths in tribute to those lost.

But coronavirus restrictions meant the service could not go ahead, with the organisers coming up with a new way for the day to be marked.

Trevor, a self-employed taxi driver who is temporarily working as a delivery driver for Asda, was asked to record a video message, passing on his condolences to others who have lost family members and colleagues, including those who have been claimed by the virus as they work on the frontline, as well as acknowledging others who are helping to keep the country running.

In it, he tells viewers: “Workers’ Memorial Day gives us a chance as a family to pay tribute to Jason, our beautiful son.

“He left for work in the morning and would never return.

“Our lives changed forever as each as every day we wait with a heavy heart and face another day with the unbearable pain of losing Jason.”

Ahead of the day, he said: “After what happened to Jason, we do everything we can to show how important health and safety in the workplace is.

”It’s emotional for us as a family, but if by doing this it prevents something happening to one other person, it’s worth it.”

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