Victorian news
Construction company charged over roller death
WorkSafe has charged a Brooklyn civil construction company, Multiworks Australia, over the death of a worker crushed by a road roller in Mildura. The 58-year-old man was crushed while helping load the roller onto a tray truck in a depot on 24 October 2017.
2019 WorkSafe Awards
Urgent: nominate your HSR now - entries for the 2019 WorkSafe Awards are now open.
Now in their 31st year, the awards celebrate the achievements of businesses and individuals that improve health and safety in the workplace and support workers who have been injured on the job. They're also a great way for workplaces to share their success and show how they are leading the way.
Of greatest interest to us is the Health and Safety Representative of the Year Award - if you've got a great HSR, then nominate them now to show how much you appreciate what they do! Entries close May 31st - so there's not a lot of time to think about it. Enter here.
Safety Soapbox
The last edition of Safety Soapbox was posted on May 8 and is full of information for workers in the construction, utilities, mining and quarrying industries. The editorial, by Michael Nathan, Senior Engineer (Major Construction Projects), WorkSafe, is on plant, which is an ongoing concern in the construction industry with an increase in workplace incidents. This includes mobile cranes, elevated work platforms, earth moving machinery (eg loaders and excavators), drilling and piling rigs, and forklifts.
Also attached to the electronic email is a document providing a summary of reported incidents for the month of April. During this period the there were 202 incidents to WorkSafe. Of these, 68% resulted in a physical injury. Of the injuries, 5 per cent were serious, 49 per cent 'significant' and 46 per cent minor. 43 incidents involved a young worker.
Access the May 8 edition of Safety Soapbox here - the document on reported incidents can be downloaded from the page.
WorkSafe looking for inspectors
WorkSafe Victoria is establishing an infrastructure project inspection team and needs to recruit more construction inspectors. Applications close May 22. As well as construction inspectors, the regulator has also advertised a number of multi-disciplinary inspectors in locations including Melbourne; the South West Coast and Shepparton/Gouldburn Valley. Check out the job ads here. and here.
Safe Work Australia news
Fatality statistics
As of April 28, there had been 51 fatalities notified to Safe Work Australia - as reported in our last edition. The workers killed have come from the following industries:
- 19 in Transport, postal & warehousing
- 13 in Agriculture, forestry & fishing
- 7 in Construction
- 7 in Public Administration & safety
- 3 in Electricity, gas, water & waste services
- 2 in Mining
To check for updates, and for more details on fatalities since 2003, go to the Safe Work Australia Work-related fatalities webpage and in particular, here.
