An Australian employer realised too late how costly it can be when workplace safety is taken for granted and not implemented all the time.

The Australia steel fabrication business Bibra Lake was obliged to pay a whopping $75,000 over an incident that involved a contractor who was seriously injured when the scissor-lift on which he was working was struck by a crane.

Metwest Steel Pty Ltd eventually pleaded guilty for their inability to provide and oversee a safe workplace for the contractor who was carrying out work, and for that same failure, led to cause serious injury and harm to the employee of the contractor, and was therefore fined recently in the Fremantle Magistrates Court.

A company awaits its respective sentence after pleading guilty last month for a back-breaking fall that seriously broke an employee’s back at a Nishi work site.

Last month, a mushroom farm owner and manager was ordered by the court to pay the outstanding fine of $50,000 in Bendigo Magistrates court as penalty over a gas explosion incident that lead to a worker seriously getting burned and suffering from injuries caused by the explosion.

A senior official of the Construction, Forestry, Mining, and Energy Union (CFMEU) of the Australian Capital Territory branch is currently facing court after being reported as refusing to obey the standard safety rules during a site visit. Also, Fair Work Building and Construction (FWBC) is alleging Australian Capital Territory CFMEU State Secretary Dean Hall, who disrupted a concrete pour and likewise threatened to stop another.

Last week, a psychiatrist, who informed the VWA that his patient was sicker than she actually was to extend her stay in hospital so he could get more payments, was sentenced to a six-month imprisonment and suspended for nine months and was ordered to pay fines and restitution to an outstanding amount of $50,000.