An employer's failure to address the obvious risks posed by its "incredibly cluttered" warehouse set off a "catastrophic" sequence of events, and has led to a $5.6 million damages award to an injured worker.
After years of "almost farcical" proceedings, a judge has set a date for determining a worker's claim he was relentlessly bullied and tormented at his Canberra workplace, which was the subject of a major WHS probe and scathing findings.
Australia's "only validated psychosocial risk assessment survey" has been relaunched on a free digital platform, under an initiative jointly funded by the country's workplace health and safety regulators.
> Customer's death costs employer $500k; > Labour-hire fines increase to $370k, as fatality alerts issued; and > Seventy-seven WHS notices issued in troubled suburb.
> Employer charged with fatal exclusion-zone breach; > Company contravened safety duties to workplace visitor; and > ACT work sites failing to learn from repeated safety blitzes.
In this major report, OHS Alert examines all the must-know work health and safety, workers' compensation and work-related COVID-19 developments from the fourth quarter of 2020, with highlights including a series of important legislative changes and near-record WHS fines.
An employer has been ordered to pay $120,000 in damages to an office worker who was injured while running to answer the phone, in a case highlighting the risks posed by systems requiring staff to rush.
Safe Work Australia has updated the model WHS Regulations and its guidance on the meaning of "person conducting a business or undertaking", while WHS provisions have been amended in NSW and South Australia, and the ACT has established a public register for reporting infringements by WHS licensees.
OHS Alert is taking a break for a few weeks, and we're leaving you with a list of our most popular articles from the last 12 months - a list dominated by our leading stories on managing the work-related risks of COVID-19, and high-profile court cases.
