Browsing: Workplace safety court and tribunal decisions | Page 199

Unions have called for reckless managers to be jailed for worker fatalities, and for offshore safety laws to be strengthened, after a major employer was handed a "paltry" fatality fine, and an investigation into an offshore death found the workplace wasn't covered by Australian OHS laws.

A worker sacked for allegedly breaching the WHS Act by spitting on a colleague has been reinstated, after a commission identified significant omissions in the employer's investigation report.

• Start date flagged for new CoR laws;
  
• Customer injury ends in $90k safety fine; and
  
• Employer defied prohibition notice.

An employer has unsuccessfully claimed that a manufacturer was partly liable for a worker's hand amputation, by supplying equipment without adequate guarding.

An employer has been fined after a roof collapsed and killed a labour-hire worker, with a court finding it failed to maintain an effective system for keeping the roof free of debris.

The Fair Work Commission has upheld the sacking of a worker who sent repeated unwelcomed text messages to a colleague, after finding the messages sent outside of work hours still had implications for the employer.

In a decision that could broaden the coverage of anti-bullying laws, a Fair Work Commission full bench has quashed a finding that a state government agency isn't a trading corporation.

An employer whose poorly-written policy for exclusion zones was "apt to mislead the ordinary reader", has been found guilty of WHS offences, after a worker was seriously injured in a forklift incident.

An employer's OHS fine has been increased more than seven-fold, on appeal, after a court found its failure to ensure workers adhered to a traffic management plan could have killed a truck driver.

An employer that had extensive safety systems, but failed to adopt two processes that could have prevented a worker from being fatally crushed by falling cargo, has been fined $150,000.