01:39 pm, Monday 8 November, 2010

The Department of Education and Early Childhood Development (DEECD) has been brought to court by WorkSafe Victoria over injuries sustained by two secondary school students in metalwork classes.

At Melbourne County Court, the department pleaded guilty to breaching Section 23 of the Occupational Health and Safety Act, and was fined $60,000.

The charges were in connection to two incidents in 2005 in Kangaroo Flat and Kyneton secondary schools involving a Year 10 and Year 9 student, respectively.

Both pupils injured their fingers during metalwork classes while using grinders with inadequate guards.

In the two incidents, the students’ hands were pulled into the gap between the grinding wheel and the tool rest.

“Getting practical experience in woodwork and metalwork classes is an important part of education – but some of the equipment can be dangerous,” said Ian Forsyth, WorkSafe’s Executive Director for Health and Safety.

“The Department, schools, teachers and supervisors must understand that students might not realise that this sort of equipment can cause serious injury.

“Risks to students could be faulty or unsafe equipment, not getting enough instruction in how to use the equipment, and not being supervised closely enough.

“Like any workplace, schools are responsible for making sure students are safe while they’re learning.”

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08:51 pm, Friday 1 October, 2010

A 15-year-old boy was hurt after cutting himself with an angle grinder in south-east Queensland on Wednesday.

A call was received by ambulance officers about the incident at a Glastonbury property near Gympie about 8:30am (AEST).

The teen broke his left forearm and sustained a 20-centimetre gash due to the power tool accident.

He was transported by air to a Brisbane hospital for treatment.

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03:03 pm, Saturday 18 September, 2010

WorkSafe Victoria inspectors have uncovered a heap of safety breaches in Braeside after conducting an intensive safety inspection.

WorkSafe personnel visited 140 small businesses in Braeside during a five-day safety blitz, and issued 229 infringement notices.

Some of the safety issues found included grinders lacking machine guards, improper storage of dangerous goods, exposed electrical wiring and other electrical hazards.

Ross Pilkington, WorkSafe manufacturing and logistics director, said the inspectors will come back to the area to check if the safety issues were remedied.

“Although we wrote to the businesses and told them we would be visiting, we still had to pull them up on a high number of health and safety issues,” Pilkington said.

“In many cases, the safety solutions were straightforward. But the bottom line is that’s more notices than we should need to be issuing.”

Steve Dargabel of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union said the large number of violations discovered was unacceptable.

“Clearly, employers are not doing the right thing,” he said.

“We’ve had serious and fatal accidents in the Braeside area and in my experience these incidents are usually utterly preventable.”

“Unfortunately, I don’t think what’s going on in Braeside is unusual or unique – it’s a snapshot of Victoria,” Dargabel observed.

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05:08 pm, Friday 30 July, 2010

Construction safety is in the limelight at a coaches’ breakfast on Wednesday.

The Western Bulldog’s coaches’ review breakfast was in line with the launch of WorkSafe’s  new campaign promoting the use of the right tools for the job among tradies.

“The purpose of the coaches’ breakfast is to talk about tactics of the game – we’re using it to discuss tactics for getting construction work done safely,” WorkSafe’s Construction Director Chris Webb said.

“Tools used on construction sites across Victoria every day are involved in a third of all construction worker injuries.

“Ladders, scaffolds, nailguns, saws and grinders feature all too often in injury claim reports – and as a result we’re seeing tradies off work, for about a month on average, with nasty yet preventable injuries like serious cuts, broken bones, and sprains and strains.

“Tradies need to think about the tools and equipment they need to do a job safely – and make sure they’ve got them on hand before they start the job.

“WorkSafe wants builders and tradies to stop, step back and think. For example, a carpenter erecting a wall frame at a housing site needs to plan ahead to use a saw bench so they’re not working on the ground cutting all the timbers. Nail and ramset guns need to be in good working order and guards in place on circular saws.”

The safety agency’s campaign is primarily aimed at parties in the residential construction industry such as builders, subcontractors, supervisors and apprentices.

Site inspections will be conducted as part of the campaign to ensure that workers’ tools and equipment are suitable for the work at hand.

“Victoria’s construction industry paid out an estimated $91 million in the year to June for claims following tool and equipment injuries,” Mr Webb said.

“The cost of an injury including time off the tools, replacing the worker, and re-training comes to over $80,000 – without including treatment costs. It makes good business sense to prevent unnecessary injuries by using the most appropriate tools for the job, and using them in the right way,” he said.

WorkSafe is in the fourth phase of its Back to Basics campaign, which targets the most common causes of injuries among domestic construction workers.

The campaign had previously tackled basic site housekeeping, planning for a job, and site supervision.

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