Workplace safety laws and safety-bonus schemes are likely to be overhauled, with an inquiry into a methane explosion, which seriously injured five workers, finding a major company's gas control measures couldn't cope with its high production levels, and should have been subjected to greater scrutiny from the regulator.
A major government employer has successfully stayed two WHS improvement notices aimed at its violence prevention processes, with a commission finding the notices could be overturned, and having to comply with them in the meantime would not be fair on the employer.
A PCBU has been fined $240,000 for its "reckless" approach to dust control over a period of nearly seven years, which appears to have resulted in at least four workers developing the deadly lung disease silicosis.
The findings of an employer-initiated WHS inspection of its own workplace have helped defeat a worker's contention, before a commission, that the site was so unsafe he was forced to resign.
In a film produced for toolbox talks and pre-shift meetings, a young worker has explained how his boss disregarded his safety concerns in the moments before they were nearly killed by a powerline. The boss was later fined for safety breaches. Some 1,500km away, regulators have issued warnings after a spate of work-related powerline incidents, including a fatality.
An upstream WHS duty holder's failure to properly respond to safety concerns raised about a structural design resulted in a worker sustaining physical and psychological injuries, a court has found.
