Ausgrid secret report finds paying compo less expensive than maintaining safety checks
Ausgrid has slashed its safety inspector numbers by more than half after a secret report found it was cheaper to pay compensation for injured workers than to maintain safety checks.
Electricity giant Ausgrid has slashed its safety crews after a secret report found it was cheaper to pay out workers who were permanently disabled from electric shocks than run expensive safety checks.
An internal report by bean counters CutlerMerz, found the electricity supplier could save more than $500,000 a year if it was prepared to pay a permanently injured worker $28,000 compensation.
After receiving the report in May, Ausgrid has slashed its safety inspection team by 14 from 25 to 11, and said the taxpayer-funded Building Commission NSW should do the inspections instead.
Electrical Trade Union spokeswoman Tara Koot said the report did not take into account risks to the public that would dramatically increase with the removal of safety inspectors for new homes.
“Ausgrid has said the cost of doing work is more important than the lives of workers,” Ms Koot said.
Members of the public could also be put at risk from fires, explosions and electrocutions when unchecked installations were plugged into the grid, Ms Koot said.
“This report has not even looked at the risk to the public, but they are acting on it anyway.”
Major networks are seconding specialised technicians to renewable energy projects rather than to tackling the record backlog of thousands of outstanding repairs to the NSW network.
The internal risk assessment by CutlerMerz found that “the cost of the current inspection regime” was “grossly disproportionate” to the safety risks it prevented.
The report found cutting safety inspections would save $520,219 a year. The risk was that over the next 40 years a worker could be permanently disabled, costing $28,375 a year in compensation.
Ausgrid has now slashed its inspection team by more than half – from 25 to 11, which is down from about 75 a decade ago.
Even before the inspectors were axed, inspections by Ausgrid had plummeted from 45,000 to just 12,000 a year.
The remaining inspectors are responsible for checking Ausgrid’s 49,000km of overhead and underground powerlines, half a million power poles and more than 30,000 substations.
The internal report concluded that “installation safety is not part of Ausgrid’s regulatory obligations” and that the Building Commission NSW should do the work instead.
National Electrical and Communications Association chief executive Oliver Judd said Ausgrid cutting its inspectors dragged it into line with Endeavour Energy and opened the way for unchecked cowboy contractors to put lives at risk.
Ausgrid spokesman Dean Starkey put responsibility for installation safety on the electricians carrying out the work and the Building Commission.
“The Building Commission is the primary regulator for electrical installation safety, while Ausgrid focuses its inspection efforts on network safety.”
NSW Premier Chris Minns said his government would take a “zero tolerance” approach to any compromise on safety.
“The idea that it would be cheaper to pay out injuries than to protect your workforce is one we completely reject,” Mr Minns said on Friday.
“We’ve got the strictest rules in the country when it comes to Safe Work, inspections and enforcement, and I can promise you, we’ll deploy them.
“It can be zero tolerance when it comes to safety in the workplace, particularly when you’re dealing with electricity and we’re watching the situation very closely.”
Originally published as Ausgrid secret report finds paying compo less expensive than maintaining safety checks
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