Browsing: Authority/inspectorate (NT) | Page 16

A ballooning company faces a WHS fine of up to $1.5 million, after a court quashed an earlier finding that a fatality was an aviation rather than workplace matter. Meanwhile, a school operator has been charged with a category 2 offence after a student was killed at a carnival.

OHS Alert publishes the most comprehensive quarterly updates on WHS and workers' comp developments in Australia. This edition revisits all the major legislative developments and cases in every jurisdiction from January, February and March 2017.

A number of Australian jurisdictions have taken steps to identify and ban firefighting foams containing perfluorinated chemicals, but the toxic substances are used in thousands of other products, an expert in contaminated work sites has warned.

• Series of WHS developments announced in NSW; and
  
• GHS exemptions revealed for NT.

• Safety management systems due soon in NSW;
  
• Second coal burst occurs at double-fatality site;
  
• Regulators issue tree, silo and pesticide alerts; and
  
• ReturnToWork SA announces new CEO.

An appeal court has upheld a fatality-related WHS charge, after finding the defective complaint could be amended because the defendant had been in possession of other information - like a prohibition notice - which gave it "sufficient understanding" of the accusations.

• Repeat offender fined for sixth guarding breach; and
  
• NT WorkSafe gets new minister and department.

• Three workers electrocuted in a month;
  
• Employers pointed to height-safety guidance; and
  
• Comcare releases GHS tool, as FSC expands online service.

Two employers, including one that covered a dangerous ventilation shaft with a thin layer of concrete, have been ordered to pay a total of $235,000 in fines and costs, after workers sustained serious limb injuries. Meanwhile, another company has entered a $160,000 safety undertaking after a customer was injured.

This latest instalment of OHS Alert's long-running quarterly update series, dating back to 2004, outlines all the major safety and workers' compensation developments in every jurisdiction from January, February and March 2016.