Options Properties Ltd has been prosecuted after the men were found to be working 65 feet up next to a sheer drop at the Madison Apartments in Trafford on 14 May 2009.

Trafford Magistrates’ Court heard the men worked for a company called P&R Structural Glazing Ltd, hired by Options Properties to fit glass balconies to the properties in the newly-built apartments.

The men had originally been working on scaffolding, but this was removed by Options Properties, leaving them with just a harness attached to a guardrail to stop them falling to the ground below.

HSE Inspector Ian Betley said: “It beggars belief that Options Properties Ltd risked the lives of these two men for the cost of a few extra days of scaffold hire.

“There is no way of knowing whether the guardrail and harness set up would have held these men on the balcony.

“Had one of them slipped, he would have taken his colleague with him and they could both have fallen to their deaths.”

Options Properties Ltd, of Princess Street, Manchester was fined £18,000 and ordered to pay costs of £4,115 after pleading guilty to safety breaches.