Two companies fined $65,000 over construction fall risks

The companies pleaded guilty to seven charges under the Occupational Health and Safety Act and Regulations and were sentenced in the Dandenong Magistrates' Court on Friday 19 September. WAM Homes was the principal contractor for both projects, with Wanjia engaged as a subcontractor at Noble Park.

WAM Homes was convicted and fined $45,000 across four charges of failing to keep workplaces under its management and control safe and without health risks. It received a further $2,500 fine for failing to ensure construction work was carried out by someone holding a current construction induction card.

Wanjia was fined without conviction: $15,000 for failing to reduce fall risks through a passive fall prevention device and $2,500 for failing to ensure a worker had a current construction induction card. Each company was also ordered to pay $3,266 in costs.

The court heard that WorkSafe inspectors returned to the Boronia site in July 2023 after previously issuing WAM Homes a prohibition notice over fall risks. They found several workers on a townhouse balcony without perimeter guard rails or scaffolding. The unprotected edge was about three metres above the ground.

At the Noble Park site in April 2024, inspectors saw a worker standing on an A-frame ladder on a townhouse's upper floor near an unprotected edge more than three metres above ground level. Another worker stood at the ladder's base with his back to the edge. There were no fall protection devices or guard rails, and one worker did not have a construction induction card. Wanjia had been contracted to supply and install structural steel.

The court also heard that WAM Homes had previously been fined $15,000 without conviction for fall risks identified during WorkSafe's original visit to the Boronia site in 2022. Between December 2021 and July 2022, WorkSafe issued the company 11 improvement notices concerning work at height.

WorkSafe Chief Health and Safety Officer Sam Jenkin said the regulator had no tolerance for employers repeatedly ignoring fall risks. “Seeing a company who has previously faced enforcement action and been made aware of its safety failures show the same careless attitude over and over is simply inexcusable,” Mr Jenkin said.

“Fall prevention measures aren’t a box ticking exercise to satisfy WorkSafe after a visit – they are often the difference between life and death, and employers who don’t bother implementing them are not only breaking the law but showing a complete disregard for the safety of their workers.”

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