The Department of Defence has been convicted and fined for failing to manage psychosocial risks relating to the death of a worker – the first penalty of its kind for a Commonwealth employer. The NSW Local Court convicted Defence and imposed a $188,000 fine after the Defence worker’s supervisors failed to manage the serious and foreseeable psychosocial risks arising from a relentless series of performance management work plans.
The sentencing follows a Comcare investigation into the on-duty suicide of a 34-year-old Royal Australian Air Force technician at the RAAF's Williamtown based in NSW. At the time of the man’s death in July 2022 he had been subjected to four separate Work Plans over a six-month period.
Despite the worker displaying increasing signs of distress and ill-health during the process, Defence did not take reasonably practicable measures to eliminate or minimise the health and safety risks faced by the man. The risks were obvious and known to Defence through their own existing policies and guidelines, which in this case were not applied and followed in practice, and were not supported by training those responsible for implementing them.
Risk controls available to Defence included training supervisors to:
- understand how a Work Plan may be a psychosocial hazard
- identify psychosocial risks associated with workers subject to performance management through Work Plans; and
- eliminate or minimise psychosocial risks arising from Work Plans, including when to refer a worker for medical assessment and suspend the performance management process.
Comcare’s CEO Colin Radford said, “Comcare’s investigation found that at no point during this process did the worker’s supervisors refer him for support, place him on leave, or take any other steps to relieve the stress and pressure he clearly felt.”
“The investigation found Defence knew the worker was not coping and that he was also experiencing personal issues. The serious and foreseeable risks required a proactive approach to work health and safety that the department failed to deliver.”
In addition to the conviction and fine, the Court also imposed an adverse publicity order on the Department of Defence, with details of the order to be determined. Adverse publicity orders can require organisations to publicise their offending, its consequences, the penalty imposed and any other relevant matter.
Increased use by the courts of adverse publicity orders is one of the recommendations of the Victorian Sentencing Advisory Council report on OHS sentencing which was released in February 2025.
Read more: Defence convicted after RAAF worker death | Comcare
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