Australian Lawyers Alliance hits out at Tasmania’s lack of industrial manslaughter laws

Lawyers have taken a hard line on Tasmania’s workplace safety laws, saying industrial manslaughter laws are necessary to keep employers honest and ensure safe environments for employees.

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CALLS are growing for industrial manslaughter to be made a crime in Tasmania, with the Australian Lawyers Alliance supporting a push to permit prosecution of companies for a death in the workplace.

Labor and unions have previously called for a toughening of legislation about workplace deaths, saying many other Australian states and territories had done so, or signalled their intention to.

ALA spokesman Fabiano Cangelosi said significant penalties for workplace fatalities where there had been negligence would ensure employers took workplace safety seriously.

“We need to make the message clear: if your workplace kills someone, you could go to prison,’’ he said.

Australians Lawyers Alliance spokesman Fabiano Cangelosi.

“Employers and businesses need to know they can be prosecuted and that the consequences, including prison time, will be significant if they do not take safety seriously.”

It comes as ministers across the country responsible for workplace health and safety prepare to consider the recommendations of an independent review into laws on the issue in coming months.

A state government spokeswoman said the government was committed to ensuring Tasmanian workplaces were the safest in the country, saying it would continue to work with other jurisdictions to ensure laws provided the appropriate level of protection for workers.

“The crime of manslaughter is provided for in our Criminal Code Act,’’ the spokeswoman said.

But Mr Cangelosi said industrial manslaughter laws would fill the gap between the provisions of the Work Health and Safety Act and the Tasmanian Criminal Code.

“We need to ensure there are consequences when a worker is injured or killed because they have been given instructions which are plainly contrary to appropriate safety practice and in which obvious safety concerns have been ignored,” he said.

Labor workplace relations spokeswoman Michelle O’Byrne said it was time Tasmania made industrial manslaughter a crime and made the range of penalties more serious.

Labor’s Michelle O’Byrne. Picture: KIM EISZELE

Ms O’Byrne said modest fines sent the wrong message to employers.

Mr Cangelosi said the experiences of other Australian states indicates the possibility of criminal charges was a “strong motivator” to ensure workplace safety.

Figures released in July under Right to Information laws revealed there were 38 workplace fatalities reported to WorkSafe Tasmania between 2014 and May this year.

The statistics showed there were 2568 “notifiable incidents” reported in Tasmania during that time, with WorkSafe conducting formal investigations into 21 of 38 workplace fatalities, 64 investigations into 858 cases of serious injury and 28 investigations into 1642 reports of dangerous incidents.

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