Garment manufacturer fined over work injury

Monday, 30 March, 2009

RM Williams was fined a total of $14,400 plus costs after pleading guilty to two breaches of workplace safety laws, in failing to provide a safe workplace and plant and failing to notify SafeWork SA of a notifiable work-related injury.

SafeWork SA prosecuted the firm after investigating an incident which occurred at the company’s Salisbury factory in 2007. A female employee had two fingertips of her right hand trapped and crushed in a machine which stamped logos on leather products. The injuries required surgery to repair a fractured finger and she also suffered a severe shock reaction.

SafeWork SA was notified by the victim herself about a week later.

Investigators found the machine had inadequate features to prevent access to moving parts and a risk assessment conducted five years prior was informal and undocumented.

The court was told that the employee was new to the task involved and had operated the machine for about 30 minutes when she was injured.

In his decision on penalty, Industrial Magistrate Stephen Lieschke said worse injuries than those suffered by the woman could have eventuated: “The … offence occurred as a result of an inappropriately informal approach to [the employer’s] obligations with respect to operators of this machine. The risk had been present for a considerable period … was clearly foreseeable and easily avoided.”

Magistrate Lieschke discounted the penalty by 20% for the company’s early guilty plea, contrition, cooperation and remedial action to improve its safety systems.

SafeWork SA Executive Director, Michele Patterson said the process of finding and fixing hazards with equipment and work processes must always be detailed and thorough: “It can’t be treated lightly for everyone’s sake, but particularly for workers who are new to a job or process, as statistics consistently show they’re the ones most vulnerable to harm. Sadly, this case has highlighted nothing we haven’t seen before and everything that could have been done to prevent it happening in the first place.”