Three workers went up onto a roof to clean solar panels. It was routine maintenance — the kind of job that happens at businesses all over Australia without much fanfare.
Before they climbed up, someone gave them a few verbal instructions. Stay between the rows of panels. Keep two metres from the edge. And stay away from the skylights — the Perspex covers won’t hold your weight.
A supervisor was around, sort of. Handling other things at the same time.
At around 1:30 in the afternoon, one of the workers fell through a skylight. Eight metres. Onto a concrete floor.
He suffered serious head and brain trauma. He remains highly dependent on others for daily care.
Two companies. One combined fine of $590,000.
The business was actually two related companies — a meat processing operator and a labour hire company that supplied its workers. Both shared the same directors and shareholders: a father and a son.
Both pleaded guilty to offences under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (NSW). In February 2026, the NSW District Court fined the operator $320,000 for two offences and the labour hire company $270,000 for one. [1]
The directors themselves were not personally prosecuted — but not because they were in the clear. It was simply the prosecutor’s choice. A different decision could have meant the father and son each facing separate personal charges from the same incident, one for each company they directed. That exposure was real, and the court said so plainly.
What was missing
When the court examined what led to this outcome, six specific things were found to be absent. None of them are extraordinary. That’s what makes this case worth reading carefully.
- The task wasn’t in the induction or policy documents. Workers were cleaning solar panels on a roof. But that task had never been written into the company’s induction materials or policies. If it isn’t documented, it’s very difficult to argue you managed it.
- There was no documented system of work. A system of work is simply the written plan for how a job gets done safely — the steps, the hazards, the controls. For roof work with skylights and no edge protection, that plan didn’t exist.
- No risk assessment had been completed or recorded. Before the workers went up, nobody had formally documented the hazards, assessed what could go wrong, or recorded what was being done about it. A mental check-in doesn’t leave a record.
- The businesses hadn’t looked at available guidance. Safe Work Australia publishes free Codes of Practice for working at heights. [2] Neither company had made itself aware of them. The court found that not knowing about freely available guidance isn’t a defence — it’s a failure.
- The only protection was a verbal instruction. Workers were told to stay away from the skylights. But nothing physical stopped them from getting close. No covers. No barriers. No edge protection. ‘We told them not to’ is a weak position when something goes wrong.
- The permanent protections could have been there from the start. After the incident, the operator installed permanent skylight covers, guardrails and anchor points, and a formal roof access permit system. Every one of those steps could have been in place before anyone climbed up.
Four of those six failures were documentation problems
The first four failures — missing induction content, no system of work, no recorded risk assessment, and no engagement with available guidance — aren’t structural problems that require major investment. They’re workforce compliance documentation gaps.
They’re the kind of gaps that quietly build up in otherwise well-run businesses when there’s no system making sure they’re covered. No platform prompting someone to ask: has this task been assessed? Is it in the induction? Is there a risk assessment on file?
Recent research into how Australian organisations manage compliance found that 43% of businesses say their biggest challenge is keeping records accurate and easy to retrieve — and 37% say they struggle to be confident that nothing important gets missed. [3] This case is exactly what that looks like when it goes wrong.
Kinatico Compliance gives organisations a single place to build and assign induction activities that cover every role and task — including the peripheral ones. To create and store documented systems of work. To require and track risk assessments. To keep policies current and delivered to the right people.
The physical failures — no skylight covers, no edge protection — those are capital decisions. No software fixes a missing guardrail. But the documentation gaps are precisely where the right platform gives you the process, the record, and the confidence that nothing has been missed.
▶ See how Kinatico Compliance keeps your workforce documentation in order. Book a free demo →
A word on director liability
Australian WHS law places a positive duty on directors and officers to exercise due diligence under section 27 of the model Work Health and Safety Act. [4] That means understanding the hazards in your operations, ensuring adequate resources and processes are in place, and being able to demonstrate you’ve done so.
That last part — demonstrate — is where documentation earns its place. When the paperwork doesn’t exist, a director’s defence of due diligence becomes very hard to substantiate. And in most states and territories of Australia, directors cannot insure against WHS fines. The fine is personal.
The question worth asking today
The businesses in this case weren’t reckless. They had workers doing a job, someone keeping an eye on things, and a general sense they knew what they were doing. What they didn’t have was the paperwork.
Ask yourself: if a SafeWork inspector walked in today and asked to see documented systems of work for every task your people perform — not just the core roles, but the ad hoc jobs, the maintenance tasks, the things workers pick up informally — could you produce them?
If the answer is ‘probably not for everything,’ that’s where to start.
Coming next
The regulatory environment in 2026 is more demanding than it was when this incident occurred in 2021. In February 2026, NSW became the first Australian state to pass legislation making AI, algorithms, and digital work management tools an explicit workplace safety consideration. [5]
If your business uses software to allocate shifts, manage rosters, or track worker performance — that software is now part of your WHS obligations. In We look at what that means in plain terms and what businesses need to do about it.
Read Part 2: Your Workplace Software Is Now a WHS Risk → [link added once published]
References
[1] SafeWork NSW v Pendle Ham & Bacon (No 3) [2026] NSWDC 15 — https://jade.io/article/1183719
[2] Safe Work Australia — Code of Practice: Managing the Risk of Falls at Workplaces — https://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/doc/model-code-practice-managing-risk-falls-workplaces
[3] Honeycomb Strategy — Kinatico Platform Adoption Research, Topline Report (May 2026) —
[4] Safe Work Australia — Model Work Health and Safety Act, s.27 Officer Due Diligence — https://www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/law-and-regulation/model-whs-laws
[5] Work Health and Safety Amendment (Digital Work Systems) Act 2026 (NSW) — Norton Rose Fulbright — https://www.nortonrosefulbright.com/en-au/knowledge/publications/d75c5d28/nsw-parliament-passes-digital-work-systems-bill-what-employers-need-to-know
This article is for general information only and does not constitute legal advice. For advice specific to your situation, please consult a qualified WHS or employment law professional.
