‘AN unnecessary loss of life.’ Judge Patrick Eccles will never utter truer words in court than those he used to describe the death of Yelena Hasselberg-Langley.

Yelena had an extremely difficult life.

She was blind, paraplegic, epileptic and severely disabled and was totally reliant on the care given to her at Lifeways Community Care in Cowley. And she was failed in the most horrific way, leading to an agonising death when she was lowered into a scalding bath.

Yesterday, the care company was fined £100,000 for health and safety breaches and we are glad this case attracted such a severe fine.

Yelena was failed because a valve in the bath was not set to regulate the temperature, and staff did not bother checking the water in the time-honoured way of dipping an elbow in.

Judge Eccles made reference to this being a lapse in Lifeways’ standards and the not-for-profit enterprise seized on this.

Lifeways, no doubt hoping this will not damage its business running more than 350 care homes, would have been wiser just to make its apology rather than going on about its usually high standards.

There is nothing it can say that excuses how it utterly failed Yelena. An unnecessary loss of life indeed.