Browsing: Young/inexperienced workers | Page 3

With the focus of National Safe Work Month shifting to vulnerable workers like the young and inexperienced this week, a compensation lawyer has highlighted the plight of a teenage worker who was injured twice in one day, including by being shot in the head by a nail gun.

A union investigating suspected violence- and workload-related WHS contraventions failed to comply with requirements of the WHS Act and Regulation when it sought employee records while exercising its entry rights, a commissioner has found.

A PCBU has been handed a pre-discount fine of $400,000 for failing to provide an apprentice, who fell four metres at the home of the PCBU's director, with adequate supervision, a fall protection system, or any working at heights training.

An employer has been fined after failures in its communication protocols led to a client assaulting a worker, who should have been told the client had a history of inappropriate behaviour.

There remains a lack of awareness and concern about the serious health dangers posed by welding fumes, an important and timely Australian study has found, with stakeholders noting industry-wide education and legislative changes are needed to remove barriers to the use of proper safety controls.

A PCBU has been handed a pre-discount fine of $600,000 for its "wholly inadequate" safety systems, which involved directing two inexperienced workers to perform a high-risk chemicals task, and left them with serious burns from an explosion.

• WHS regulator targeting numerous NSW businesses;
  
• Key WHS measure for Cth parliamentary workplaces introduced; and
  
• WHS Regulations amended in WA.

• Workplace health and safety officer jailed over cover-up; and
  
• Everything you need to know from April, May and June.

• Platform used by public collapses, employer fined; and
  
• No-go zones urged for National Farm Safety Week.

In an extremely rare development, a judge has found the WHS offences of a reckless PCBU and a "worker" deserved the highest available penalties, totalling $3.15 million. They were charged over the grisly death of a man who was dragged into a woodchipper, and whose disappearance went unnoticed because the PCBU's systems were "so haphazard".