NSW employers have been exempted from complying with certain health monitoring regulations because of a conflict between two WHS Acts, while a South Australian PCBU has been fined for failing to monitor the health of an employee who worked with a carcinogenic chemical.
A BHP subsidiary has been handed a record-high South Australian WHS fine of $390,000, after a discrepancy in its procedures led to a worker moving too close to an unsupported mine wall, before being killed by falling rocks.
A mesothelioma victim's exemplary damages have been increased from $30,000 to $250,000, with an appeals court highlighting James Hardie's reckless indifference to the safety of its customers, and the fact that it knew from as early as the 1930s that asbestos dust was harming its workers.
An employer with an informal safety system for moving stock with forklifts has been convicted and fined for WHS breaches, after two workers were struck by 80kg steel tubes. Meanwhile, an employer that relied on the "weakest form" of administrative control has been fined over a worker's permanent hand injury.
An employer whose only form of communicating a ban on using a hazardous machine door was an informal risk assessment, has been found guilty of safety offences after a worker was fatally crushed.
The recent WHS conviction of a company officer drives home the importance of establishing due diligence plans and governance structures for senior management, Ashurst partner Trent Sebbens says in this comprehensive Q&A with OHS Alert.
A company officer failed to exercise due diligence to ensure her company complied with its WHS duty to register plant or prohibit operators from using their mobile phones, a court has found in convicting her over the death of an eight-year-old girl at a show.
In the first WHS penalty handed down in the South Australian Employment Tribunal, an employer has been fined after a worker was struck by a forklift. Meanwhile, three Victorian employers have been fined a total of $110,000 after a spate of incidents, including one where a worker was struck by an object that fell 13 storeys.
