Harley Muir’s family speaks at Bendigo County Court after Hay Australia Victoria found guilty of negligence

A distraught son has told a court how he can no longer follow in his dad’s footsteps after he was killed in a machine at work in Bridgewater, near Bendigo.

Bendigo father Harley Muir died in a workplace incident at the Hay Australia Bridgewater plant on Monday February 1, 2021. Picture: Facebook

The family of a man killed at a regional hay manufacturing plant say they are yet to receive an apology after a Victorian business was found guilty of criminal negligence over the workplace death.

Harley Muir, 29, suffered fatal injuries when he became entangled in a multibaler machine on February 1, 2021 at Hay Australia Victoria’s factory in Bridgewater, near Bendigo.

Mr Muir was crushed as he placed his body between a stationary and moving part of the machine.

His employer, at the time of his death, was called Hay Australia Victoria but was charged with negligence under the name 623452924HAV Pty Ltd.

Harley Muir. Picture: Facebook

The company has since been bought by Hay Australia, which is unrelated to the case.

During a trial at which the business was found guilty, defence lawyers alleged Mr Muir deliberately stepped into the wrong part of the machine with the intention of taking his own life.

Prosecutors said the company should have installed a light curtain — which would cut the power to the machine if an object passed through it — in the area where Mr Muir was killed.

At court on Tuesday, Mr Muir’s son said he “didn’t believe anybody” when his dad died and then felt confused and angry.

“I have his DNA and I look like him, but I feel like I can’t follow in his footsteps anymore,” he said.

“ … When I want to talk to my dad, now I have to talk to a gravestone.

“If I want to hug him, I have to hug a gravestone.”

Harley Muir's family outside Bendigo County Court on March 18, 2025. Picture: Gianni Francis

Mr Muir’s mother Sue said that when she got the news of her son’s death, she was “in total disbelief” and then screamed and cried “desperately”.

A close friend said he no longer had “a friend to lean on”.

The court heard non-operational 623452924HA now only had $20,000 in its bank account, which was owed to other people, meaning the company could not pay a fine.

Angry and upset family members shed frustrated tears outside the courtroom, where Mr Muir’s mother Sue said the family was still waiting for an apology.

The company will be sentenced on March 28.