Kalafatis is a fruit-packing business that uses labour hire employees for its operations. One of these labour hire works was director by a Kalafatis employee to clean a conveyer belt while it was energised and still running. The workers’ hair became entangled with the conveyer belt with the conveyer belt’s unguarded rotating drive, resulting in the worker losing her ear and sustaining serious injuries to her scalp.
Kalafatis was fined $66,000 after the incident. An investigation into Kalafatis’ operations revealed serious guarding deficiencies and exposed an ‘almost unimpeded’ access to the drive shafts that caused the injury. The conveyer belt was also lined with shear and entrapment hazards.
Compounding this decision, Kalafatis did not instruct workers to turn off the conveyer belt before cleaning it. The DPP also loaded an appeal over Kalafatis’ sentence in addition to the fine.
The decision emphasis how simple guarding measures can prevent serious worksite injuries. This injury could have been avoided by installing well-known guard protectors as well as training managers to provide safe directions to workers.
The fact that the worker was engaged through a labour hire company did not allow Kalafatis to avoid its responsibility to provide a safe work place to all workers.
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