Two employers have been fined a total of $180,000 after a worker died falling 11 metres thorough a skylight, while a company has been handed a second round of fines for asbestos and document-request breaches, just five months after it and its two directors were fined $605,000 under environment laws.
A WHS inspector's belief that an employer had "no system in place" to prevent life-threatening falls was "based on a misconception", the NSW Industrial Relations Commission has ruled in revoking another WHS notice.
Victoria will introduce industrial manslaughter laws, Australia's highest maximum work safety fine of more than $16 million, and special workers' comp benefits for emergency workers, after Labor retained power in Saturday's State election.
Decisive leadership and a comprehensive removal strategy are crucial to a major employer's plan to eradicate asbestos from its sites by 2030, with 60,000 square metres of asbestos-containing materials already removed to date, according to its asbestos manager.
Australia's next asbestos management plan will focus on developing a "convincing and comprehensive business case" for the prioritised removal of the deadly substance over in situ management in workplaces and elsewhere, the Asbestos Safety and Eradication Agency revealed today.
Two Australians are diagnosed with mesothelioma every day and the five-year survival rate hasn't improved in 30 years, the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW) has found. Meanwhile, an incident alert from a work safety regulator suggests the insidious disease will haunt generations to come.
