Another brick in the wall: Responses of the state to workplace fatalities in the New South Wales construction industry

The construction industry is characterised by complex contracting and sub-contracting arrangements, relatively short-term working phases and high levels of occupational injury and death. This thesis examined judgements brought by the New South Wales WorkCover Authority under the NSW Occupational Health and Safety Acts 1983 and 2000 for offences in regard to workplace fatalities, and which were heard in the Industrial Court of New South Wales from 1988-2008. It demonstrated that penalties were low, representing approximately 18 per cent of the maximum penalty allowable. This figure is commensurate with other research on penalties for workplace death, and the thesis reflects on procedures of judicial sentencing and if the de-contextualising of workplace crime in the court process and in the wider community acts to result in punishments that are questionable as deterrent measures. The thesis considers these questions through the lens of a broad political economy, addressing the social construction of penalties through the perspective of judicial rules and norms, regulatory policies, state legislation and ideological constructions about workplace health and safety offences as essentially non-criminal events.