Employer with "generic" safety system fined $60K after death

A NSW employer whose "generic" safe work method statement failed to prevent the death of an 18-year-old trainee has been fined $60,000 out of a possible $550,000.

The judge, however, praised its attempts to make safety "a priority".

In 2007, a Lithgow Tyre Service trainee was inflating a forklift tyre when the nuts and studs on its two-piece composite rim - which were old and worn - failed.

The rims split in half with explosive force and the worker was struck, sustaining fatal injuries.

The employer was charged with breaching the State Occupational Health and Safety Act 2000, in failing to provide a safe system of work and training and instruction that specifically addressed the fitting of tyres to two-piece divided rim assemblies of the type used on forklift trucks.

Risk assessments informal and undocumented

In the Industrial Court, Justice Trish Kavanagh heard the employer's OHS management systems were based on advice and documentation from an OHS consultant, who only conducted "general" risk assessments.

The employer contended - and staff agreed - employees were trained to perform informal, undocumented risk assessments for each type of rim they worked on.

The employer also said the worker had been instructed not to fit tyres with worn studs and nuts - but admitted he was not yet competent to repair a tyre in a two-piece composite frame unsupervised.

Another worker had been allocated the task, it said, but after work commenced, had moved to another job.

Justice Kavanagh found the employer's "generic" safe work method statement "contained little, if any, information relevant to the task [of] repairing a tyre that was in a two piece composite frame".

She said the worker had been given on-the-job training generally, but the training was undocumented and informal in nature; no records were made or maintained with respect to training received or competencies.

"These failures were in breach of the [employer's] own written occupational health and safety plan, in operation as at the relevant date," she said.

However, she also took into account "subjective elements".

"I note this is not a worksite where there was no system of work although this task was not recognised sufficiently in the system nor risk assessed," she said. "[The employer] had an on-going commitment to safe working and had paid a professional occupational health and safety consultant on a continuing basis."

That person:

• regularly held OHS meetings on site;

• conducted regular inspections on site; and

• advised the company of the ongoing development of its existing safe work systems.

"This [employer] had in fact one of the most continuous occupational health and safety review systems inside a small workshop that the Court has reviewed."

Justice Kavanagh said the offence was "serious" and easily preventable, but said the family company provided vital employment to a country area, and fined it $60,000.

Inspector Karen Simpson v Wingruby Pty Ltd t/as Lithgow Tyre Service [2010] NSWIRComm 104 (13 August 2010)

The purspose of continually reviewing the OHS Risk Management Program within your business is crutial for the identification of tasks that pose risk to workers.  An employer can demonstrate a safe system of work through the undertaking of a work task analysis, the development of a safe work procedure, providing on the job training and instruction, and supervision to ensure the procedure is appropriate for task being performed.  Your OHS Plan should include the review of Safe Work Procedures.  Is this the level you maintain in your business?  Take time to review....it's worth it!