In a WHS case involving the deaths of two teenage students from overseas, a court has imposed a penalty much higher than that recommended by the prosecution, stressing that unlike workers, children are particularly vulnerable to business-related hazards because they haven't been trained to recognise or mitigate risks.
The Federal Court has rejected claims by union officials that they genuinely believed they did not need right-of-entry permits to enter a site for the purpose of "resolving" WHS issues.
Employers could face increasing regulatory scrutiny where workplace fatalities or serious injuries occur, with a union pressuring government ministers to "get serious" about safety prosecutions. Meanwhile, a workplace supervisor has been fined over an induction incident.
Two companies have been ordered to pay a worker a total of nearly $1.4 million in damages, after she was injured operating a defective vehicle in an incident that could have been prevented through clearer stop-work instructions.
The prosecutions of a PCBU and an officer have sent a reminder to other duty holders that they must proactively guard against acts of carelessness or inattentiveness, including by specialist contractors.
A commission has quashed a WHS notice alleging an organisation did not have an adequate assessment process to protect workers from the risk of violence.
A worker who injured her back while lifting heavy trays has been awarded nearly $160,000 in damages, after a court found her employer negligently failed to provide proper manual handling training or enforce a 10kg lifting limit.
A worker who threw a six-kilogram object from an elevated work platform in a "moment of madness", seriously injuring an apprentice, has been found guilty of recklessness and handed a suspended prison sentence.
