In the latest of a recent series of WHS prosecutions involving failures affecting vulnerable people like children, a teacher based in another country has been sentenced over the deaths of two teenage students in Australia.
A workplace supervisor has been sentenced for recklessly allowing a drug-affected truck driver to drive and kill four police officers, but cleared of allegations he would have known the driver was in an unfit state just by looking at him. He was originally charged with four counts of manslaughter.
An employer has pleaded guilty to 16 safety breaches and been hit with $545,000 in fines, including over fire safety failures that led to staff using a flammable liquid and cardboard instead of a fire extinguisher to put out a fire on a machine and on two workers.
A controversial Bill cutting injured workers' benefits in Victoria has passed Parliament under a deal that will freeze employer premiums for at least a year.
A company director who bullied a subcontractor for four years, and abused him for raising safety concerns to do with the COVID-19 pandemic, has been convicted of workplace health and safety contraventions.
The fine imposed on an employer that failed to fully implement a mandatory safety measure, because it ran out of the required materials, has been increased more than five-fold on appeal, with a judge stressing penalties must be significant enough to dissuade others from "cutting corners".
Employers must apply the hierarchy of controls to the hazards associated with height work, which starts with not performing any such work where reasonably practicable, a regulator has advised in launching a major blitz.
A company has been convicted and fined $1.3 million in Victoria's first finalised workplace manslaughter case. Its director was also charged with manslaughter, but pleaded guilty to a less serious offence.