Worker paralysed, boss fined $40,000

Barry Healy, Perth

A Perth demolition company has been fined just $40,000 in the case of an industrial accident that left a young worker permanently paralysed.

In November 2003, a director of Murphy Demolition cut a safety pin off a "quick hitch" on an excavator that allowed various attachments to be connected to the boom. The following day, a bucket flew from the excavator as it swung around and struck 18-year-old Andrew Jamieson on the upper back, severing his spinal cord. Jamieson is now paralysed from the mid-chest down.

On November 15, in the Perth Magistrates Court, Murphy Demolition was fined $30,000 and the company directors Patrick and Daniel Murphy were fined $5000 each.

While glad of the conviction, CFMEU construction division occupational health and safety adviser Darren Kavanagh told Green Left Weekly that the fines were not enough of a deterrent for companies that flagrantly ignored health and safety laws. "It's a pretty ordinary result ... a fine of $5000 is what some directors would pay for a meal on a Friday night. Where is the deterrent?"

"The only saviour is that the conviction assists in a common-law claim against his employer", Kavanagh said.

Jamieson is an inspiration to CFMEU members. Kavanagh told GLW that he visited the young man in hospital the day after the accident. "He was talking then about the possibility of becoming a wheelchair athlete", Kavanagh said.

The CFMEU has assisted with Jamieson's ambition and he will be off to Japan shortly with the Australian basketball team.

From Green Left Weekly, November 23, 2005.

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From GLW issue 650