A small electrical installation business was fined $500 and ordered to pay the court costs of $748 by the Magistrates Court of Western Australia in April 2014 for failing to take the practicable steps to identify the hazard, assess the risk arising from the hazard, and consider the means by which the risk may be reduced in contrary to regulation 3.1 of the Occupational Safety and Health Regulations 1996.

The business which mainly engages in solar panel installation, employed a qualified electrician, a trade assistant and a labour hire apprentice electrician to install the solar panels at the Mundaring property in February 2012. Before starting the work, the electrician got up on to the roof and had a 'look around' as a part of doing a general 'Job Safety Analysis (JSA)', an informal risk assessment exercise. It appeared to the electrician that the roof was sheeted entirely with galvanished tin. However, he failed to identify that one part of the roof comprised polycarbonate sheeting (skylights). It is common knowledge in the building and roofing industry that skylights are non-trafficable.

The electrician and the apprentice commenced work on the roof.  At about 10am, the apprentice stepped backwards over the ridge of the roof onto a polycarbonate sheet. He fell approximately 3.8 metres to the ground and required emergency surgery at Royal Perth Hospital to treat his injuries.

In this incident, the risk of suffering an injury or harm to health as a result of falling through a skylight is a ‘hazard’. In the course of his work, the apprentice was exposed to the hazard. The business had a generic JSA for solar panel installation but it did not include any requirement to check the integrity or composition of the roof surface. The copy of JSA was also not available for the workers on the day of the incident. The incident could have been prevented, if the business had rigorous procedures of safe system of work in place.