A principal contractor that failed to adhere to its own safety inspection regime, when unscheduled out-of-sequence work was carried out, has been fined $412,500 after a worker was left with devastating injuries.
Employers have been urged to identify all powerlines at their workplaces, including around entry and exit points, after a company was convicted and fined over an electrocution. Employers have also been warned about the presence of asbestos in workplace fire doors, following exposure incidents.
A PCBU previously prosecuted over a fatality, and a facilities manager who failed to manage the entrapment hazard posed by a disused stairwell, where a visitor died, have been fined for WHS contraventions in Queensland.
A worker who became the sole director of a company in mysterious circumstances, and played no role in its running, has been fined $120,000 for breaching his WHS due diligence duties, after a teenage apprentice fell 12 metres.
An employer has been convicted of category-3 WHS breaches for failing to monitor a labour-hire worker's tasks at a placement, where he was injured performing work outside of the scope of his experience.
Two employers have been sentenced for safety breaches resulting in life-changing amputations, including one company that failed to comply with an authorisation requiring only certain personnel to work near overhead powerlines.
A PCBU that delegated its duty to enforce safety measures to a contractor, despited hearing that the circumstances at the relevant job site were a "nightmare", has been fined $300,000 over a worker's seven-metre fall.
A company that was prosecuted, over a high-profile fatality, for breaching its safety duties as a supplier of plant, has unsuccessfully argued that its $400,000 penalty was excessive because it had no control over the location of workers when the incident occurred.