The Court imposed a $70,000 fine (reduced from $187,500 after a 25% guilty plea discount, and further reduced for limited capacity to pay) on a small tree surgery company for a Category 2 WHS offence arising from failure to establish and maintain an adequate exclusion zone, resulting in a worker being struck by a falling branch. The Court held that worker non-compliance with verbal instructions does not materially reduce the objective seriousness of a failure to implement higher-order physical controls such as barriers and spotters, particularly where the worker was inexperienced and unqualified, finding the offence fell between low and mid-range objective seriousness. The Court accepted the offender's limited financial capacity but declined to reduce the fine to a level that would cease to bear a sufficient relationship to the seriousness of the offence or remove its deterrent effect.
The full text is available to signed-in members, including the 2 later cases that cite this judgment.
2 of the 2 citing cases carry a classified treatment. How each court treated it is available to signed-in members.