THE mother of a steeplejack who died in a chimney fireball blast will take her fight for justice to Westminster this month.

Linda Whelan’s son Craig, 23, originally of Crook, County Durham, died after breaches of health and safety rules.

The father-of-one, together with fellow steeplejack Paul Wakefield, 40, of Nottingham, were caught in an explosion in the 150-metre chimney they were helping to demolish at a factory near Bolton, in May 2002.

The pair died in temperatures of 220C when flames melted steel cables and their hoist crashed 100ft to the ground.

The company Mr Whelan worked for won a tender for £8,000 with the Carnaud Metal Box plant using hot cutting equipment which Mrs Whelan believes contributed to the accident.

She said rival firms using cold cutting equipment were only able to bid the work for £20,000, which she believes would have been safer.

Following the incident, three managers from Carnaud Metal Box were fined a total of £17,000 for safety breaches.

However, Mrs Whelan, 53, of Willington, County Durham, feels justice was not done and went on to co-found the Families Against Corporate Killing group. The group offers support for families and lobbies for changes to the law to make companies fully accountable for people killed at work.

As part of Workers’ Memorial Day on Tuesday, April 28, they will march from the Statue of the Unknown Construction Worker, in Tower Hill, London, to the Houses of Parliament via the Health and Safety Executive offices.

Mrs Whelan, 53, will end the day with a speech about workplace safety.

She said: “When someone is killed in the workplace, it is always recorded as an accident.

“The law needs strengthening so directors and owners of companies who put someone’s life at risk to save money and take shortcuts with training pay the price.

“If something good can come out of what happened to Craig, if it saves one person’s life, then he has not died in vain.”

The group’s website is at fack.org.uk