A union and one of its officials have been handed fines totalling nearly $37,000, after a court found the latter made a frustrated comment that constituted a threat to the future career of a workplace health and safety manager.
A major work health and safety Bill has passed in Queensland, with amendments aimed at facilitating a plan that could extend industrial manslaughter provisions to bystander deaths, and ensure multiple duty holders can be charged with manslaughter after a fatality.
Two company managers' needless insistence that a union official clarify the particulars of his WHS entry permit was a "gossamer-thin" justification for delaying his safety inspection, a court has found in a scathing ruling reiterating the practical purpose of permits.
A full Federal Court has partially overturned a ruling made against a union and an official accused of refusing to comply with a worksite's WHS requirements, finding the site's rules only required the official to be "accompanied" rather than "escorted".
Provisions for health and safety representatives and entry rights could be amended by a new Queensland WHS Bill, while a WHS blitz has found that every targeted business in one industry was breaching its health and safety obligations.
A union official who was physically aggressive towards a site manager, while inspecting suspected safety breaches, has been fined and handed a "partial" personal payment order.
A union investigating suspected violence- and workload-related WHS contraventions failed to comply with requirements of the WHS Act and Regulation when it sought employee records while exercising its entry rights, a commissioner has found.
PCBUs could be handed WHS fines of up to $100,000 in civil penalty cases launched by affected parties like workers, deceased workers' families and unions, under proposed reforms that have reached the consultation phase in South Australia.
The Federal Court has highlighted the important WHS function of escorting entry permit holders around sites, in handing penalties to a union and one of its officials for right-of-entry breaches.
A court has criticised the poor WHS knowledge of an employer and its managers, finding they unlawfully forced union officials to provide a new right-of-entry notice in order to inspect a suspected safety breach they observed while investigating another safety issue.