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A Victorian court has handed Australian Paper a $230,000 fine due to a series of safety failings, which led to the death of a worker in 2005. The court found that the machine which killed 31 year old Brett Carroll had a number of safety failings that were not identified following a separate 2002 fatality.
Carroll was carrying out maintenance on a paper making machine at the company’s Maryvale plant when a five-tonne roller fell and crushed him. He died at the scene.
WorkSafe’s investigation found a range of safety mechanisms had been removed; the original instructions for maintenance were missing while a set of instructions created after a major refurbishment in1986 had been re-written without reference to the manufacturer’s original instructions.
Describing Carroll as a hard working decent Australian who died in a workplace accident that should never have happened, Judge Howard said Paper Australia exhibited a degree of complacency.
Paper Australia, which operates four paper mills around Australia, pleaded guilty to one charge laid under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 1985.
Paper Australia was convicted and fined $160,000, and given an additional penalty of $70,000 because it had been previously prosecuted over the March 2002 fatality.
John Merritt, executive director of WorkSafe said the tragedy was that even after disaster had struck another family, lessons were not learned.
He says, “So many companies go to court saying they’ve learned from their mistakes and how they’ve gone to great lengths to prevent it happening again. What this case shows us is that while that offers a level of comfort, it’s not much consolation when those failings strike again.”
Previously, the company was convicted and charged a total of $90,000 over the death of a worker at the Maryvale paper mill in 2002.
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