A MAN jailed over health and safety failing which led to his building in Oldham to collapse into the ground in the middle of the day has lost an appeal against his conviction.

King’s House building was being converted from an office space into a shisha bar in August 2016 when disaster struck the day after it was reported to the local authority over business concerns.

Emergency services were called after the roof began to collapse. Neighbours had to be evacuated and King Street, where it is located, was closed to pedestrians for the day.

The Victorian brick building was demolished in the aftermath.

Riad Ahmad, the owner of the property, went on trial at Manchester Crown Court in 2018 and was convicted of two breaches of the health and safety at work act as well as failing to comply with regulations. He was jailed for eight months and ordered to pay £65,000 in prosecution costs.

His legal team argued he employed another company JM Builders to carry out the work and he was not involved in the day to day planning and as such was not responsible.

It also emerged no plans had ever been submitted for building regulation approval or risk assessments done and two of the three men involved did not have permission to work in the country and none of them had been involved in this type of work before.

The three of them gave evidence through a translator while Ahmad declined to take to the stand.

One of them alleged in a witness statement given in 2016 he had received £1,000 from Ahmad, who had told him to blame one of the others.

Ahmad’s legal team tried to get this evidence ruled as inadmissible but the trial judge allowed it.

In launching an appeal against conviction, Ahmad’s team argued the judge had failed to give the jury proper direction about how to respond to this evidence and also said new evidence had come to light which would cast doubt on a key witness.

But the appeal was struck down, with a statement from Lady Justice Andrews stating there was “no basis for doubting the safety of the conviction on any of the three counts”.

In her ruling, siting with Mrs Justice Cutts and Judge James Burbridge QC, the Recorder of Worcester, she said: "We are satisfied the evidence against the appellant was overwhelming, and that neither of the grounds of appeal affords any basis for doubting the safety of his conviction on any of the counts.

“This appeal is therefore dismissed.”

The council worker who visited the site the day before it collapsed spotted the danger right away.

Mark Smith stopped all work on the site and found it had been made inherently unsafe by the removal of internal walls and the roof being inadequately supported.

He found that 10 young men were working there. They refused to leave when asked to do so until he explained the risk to them.