Browsing: Authority/inspectorate (VIC) | Page 7

A worker could be jailed for up to five years, after being charged with recklessly endangering a colleague who was killed by a toppling forklift load. Meanwhile, a safety regulator has issued a special warning to "pranksters", after five workers sustained burns in a gas explosion.

• Falling-object prosecution avoided through EU; and
  
• New Code covers WHS and electricity compliance in WA.

• Employers baffled by large injury premium hikes; and
  
• Upselling "scam" breached electrical safety laws.

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

In this major must-read report, OHS Alert examines all the key workplace health and safety and workers' compensation developments from the second quarter of 2023, including a wide range of actual and proposed WHS amendments, a string of high-profile safety prosecutions, and concerns around surging burnout rates.

• Employers must destroy certain COVID vaccine records in Vic;
  
• Untrained workers handed chemical job, employer fined; and
  
• Crane supplier charged with safety offences.

Two fraudsters, including one who made workers' comp claims against companies that never employed him, have been convicted and ordered to pay back more than $250,000. Meanwhile, an employer has been fined $280,000 after the fatal crushing of a worker in a trapping space it created.

A company that repeatedly placed its workers in danger, including in underwater confined spaces, has been convicted and fined heavily under multiple reckless endangerment charges.

A company has been fined nearly $3 million for workplace safety and environmental breaches, in relation to chemical stockpiling and fire incidents that contributed to the Victorian Government's decision to introduce new recklessness offences attracting jail time.

A regulator could be empowered to overturn the decisions of companies self-insured against workplace injuries, with the Victorian Ombudsman finding the system is "patchy and unequal", and highlighting a case where a worker who was entitled to $75,000 was offered a $2,000 settlement.