The court found the company guilty of breaching section 19 of the Occupational Health Safety and Welfare Act of 1986, for failing to ensure the safety of an employee.
The incident occurred in March 2005 at Amcor’s packaging plant at Athol Park. A male employee was attempting to re-feed paper into a corrugated cardboard making machine when his right hand became trapped between two large rollers.
His hand was seriously crushed and burned, resulting in the amputation of all his fingers and part of the thumb.
According to SafeWork SA, the injury could have been prevented if the company had fitted an interlock device on the machine to prevent the rollers moving while the hazard area was accessed.
The court found the resulting injury and permanent disability indicated a very serious breach of the Act. It dismissed the company’s attempts to blame the employee for acting contrary to established safe procedure, and also rejected pleas for a discount.
According to the workplace safety authority, the company had multiple deficiencies in its safety systems with regards to machine guarding and training. It claims the result of this case coincides with the prevention campaign on machine guarding, demonstrating the need for machine guarding.