Browsing: WHS decisions (NSW) | Page 12

An employer previously convicted and subjected to WHS training orders has been fined $262,500 over another incident, with a court highlighting the absence of formal reporting between its WHS officer and senior managers.

Synergy Scaffolding Services Pty Ltd has been fined $2 million for reckless conduct that killed an 18-year-old worker, two days after his birthday, and endangered many others, at a NSW site.

In a case providing an important reminder of the extra risks faced by vulnerable workers, like those from overseas, a PCBU has been convicted and fined over the significant fall injuries sustained by the holder of a working holiday visa.

A PCBU has been fined $400,000 after a worker sustained fatal injuries falling from an unsuitable ladder, with a court slamming its site induction for being "so inadequate" that it failed to detect that the worker did not have a "white card".

A PCBU being prosecuted over a fatality has successfully challenged some of the allegations against it, including that it failed to adopt certain "common sense" safety measures to mitigate the risk of workers being crushed during maintenance tasks.

A PCBU that failed to clarify its plant isolation responsibilities to all personnel has been found guilty of WHS breaches, after a subcontractor died in a tank and his two would-be rescuers were seriously injured.

Qantas has failed to block two of four WHS charges alleging it engaged in discriminatory conduct towards an elected health and safety representative for taking actions relating to the cleaning of planes arriving from a COVID-19 hot spot.

A company that ignored its own safety systems for guarding penetrations has been handed a $600,000 pre-discount fine, after one of its managers died in a 19-metre fall through an unguarded ventilation shaft.

Just two weeks after expressing her concern and dismay at the number of fall-from-height cases coming before her court, a judge has handed down another $800,000 pre-discount fine in a case where "glaringly" obvious risks were ignored.

A judge has lamented that the height safety message from numerous WHS prosecutions is not getting through to duty holders, in handing a PCBU a pre-discount fine of $825,000 over an incident in which workers were directed to ride in an excavator bucket, before falling four metres.