THE Health and Safety Executive will not be launching an investigation into an accident which caused a woman to lose the tip of her finger.

The female employee of Hollands Pies, who has not been named, was taken to Blackburn Royal Infirmary after an incident on Thursday night.

Firefighters had been called to the Manchester Road incident at 11.25pm but said ambulance crews had already freed the woman. Graham March, managing director of Hollands Pies, said: "I can confirm that we have had an accident involving a female employee who has sustained a crush injury to the tip of her middle finger.

"She did attend hospital as a result of this injury which happened during the clean down process and we informed the Health and Safety Executive."

But a spokesperson for the Health and Safety Executive has confirmed it will not pursue the matter at this stage.

He said: "The HSE have no plans to investigate this particular incident. It seems to be at this moment that this woman lost part of the tip of her finger above the joint.

"There are specific criteria as to whether the HSE are involved in any investigation of incidents and at the moment there are no plans to carry out an investigation at this stage."

Mr March said the pie-making machine the employee was working on was isolated while changes were made to it and that work had also been carried out on other machines.

He said the machine had been in place for 20 years and there had been no previous accidents of this nature at the site.