Alpine Smallgoods: Meat factory in court over near-fatal accident
A boss who took the ‘advice’ of a delivery driver to dodgy up a platform made of pallets nearly caused the death of his employee.
South East
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A meat company has been hit with a massive fine after they let a worker use an unsafe stacking system to unload heavy boxes from a container.
R N Brand Pty Ltd, trading as Alpine Smallgoods, pleaded guilty to one charge of failing to provide a safe working environment at the Frankston Magistrates’ Court on Monday.
The court heard a container full of meat boxes was delivered to their Silkwood Rise factory site in June 2019.
Most of their deliveries were normally unloaded from a small truck by a forklift, but this container was not palletised so couldn’t be unpacked that way.
Company director Robert Brand spoke to the truck driver, asking him what was the best way to get the goods down to ground level.
A makeshift system of two stacks of pallets was then constructed and a worker began to unload the meat boxes, which weighed around 20kg each, onto another pallet so it could be taken away.
But the man fell backwards onto his head, with a heavy box landing on top of him.
Other employees rendered assistance and the man was taken to hospital by ambulance for urgent treatment.
He suffered a fractured skull, fractured spine and multiple rib breaks and spent a month in hospital, eight days of which was in the intensive care unit.
Defence lawyer Carmen Currie said the accident was a deep shock for the family-run business, which had been operating since 2007 and had never had any issues before.
She said that delivery was not routine and the truck driver had told Mr Brand what he thought was the ideal way for the container to be unloaded.
“That was not the best advice they could get, by any means,” she said.
She said immediately after the accident the business brought in an engineer who designed a custom-made piece of equipment that was fully compliant and completely safe.
She said they were remorseful and had provided ongoing support for the affected employee, who has not yet returned to work.
Magistrate Dr Michael King said failing to provide a safe workplace was a serious offence.
“Taking advice from a delivery driver is like going to the pub and seeking legal advice from someone at the bar,” Dr King said.
“Clearly there were significant risks, as demonstrated by this very incident.
“There should have been a better method used.”
R N Brand was fined $30,000 and ordered to pay $3000 in costs.
The maximum fine that could have been imposed was around $400,000.
