A second duty holder has been fined over the death of an 80-year-old workplace visitor in a disused stairwell that posed an obvious risk of falling or entrapment, while a business has been fined over a fatality that followed its failure to identify the qualifications and competencies required for high-risk tasks.
In the latest of a recent series of WHS prosecutions involving failures affecting vulnerable people like children, a teacher based in another country has been sentenced over the deaths of two teenage students in Australia.
A PCBU has lost its last-resort bid to block its WHS prosecution over the drowning deaths of a father and son, with a superior court describing its latest jurisdictional challenge as an "unacceptable fragmentation of the criminal proceeding".
A COVID-19 vaccine mandate for frontline workers has been found to be unlawful, after a superior court heard the decision-maker did not attempt to quantify the supposed safety and productivity benefits of the mandate, or the consequences of not imposing one.
A major supermarket did not breach its safety duty of care to a store manager, who allegedly suffered an overuse injury, by failing to prevent her from working "excessive" hours in the lead up to a major audit, a court has found.
A crane operator who failed to maintain a line of sight with a pedestrian colleague has been fined over the man's death. A PCBU and a manager have been charged with the industrial manslaughter of the colleague.
A major employer's failure to consult workers on a controversial WHS mandate created a "paradigm of opposition" in the workforce and led to a large number of workers being unfairly dismissed, a commission has ruled in a 529-paragraph judgment.
A local council has been fined over a lifeguard's electrical burns, in a case demonstrating that the risks and duties around overhead powerlines aren't limited to those in industries like construction and agriculture. Another employer has been fined over a WHS offence lasting 18 months.