Meatworker Alfred Edwards, known to most as “Baldy”, who died in a “wholly avoidable” incident at Talley’s Affco Wairoa processing plant in February, 2020.
Affco Wairoa has been fined just over half a million dollars for a worker’s death described by a judge as “wholly avoidable”.
Sentencing the company in Gisborne District Court today, Judge Warren Cathcart said an old freezer facility in which Alfred William Pohatu Edwards died on February 5, 2020, “should have been decommissioned years ago”.
By failing to identify the risk it posed, the company was "at least grossly careless".
Known to most as Baldy, Mr Edwards was 61 and had worked seasonally at the company for about 40 years when he was crushed beneath a steel frame crate used to transport cartons of meat products into the processing plant’s north blast freezer.
The freezer was constructed in the 1970s and had been in use at the Wairoa site since the late ’80s. It was much older than other freezers there, less automated, and only used at the height of the season.
One of the frames had become caught as it went into the freezer. Attempting to free it, Mr Edwards entered the back of the blast via an unlocked door sign posted “no entry”. He is believed to have used a steel bar to try to free a jammed carton on the frame and was crouched under it when a fully loaded frame suddenly fell on him. The weight of the frame and the 54 cartons on it — 1450 kilograms in total — killed Mr Edwards instantly.
WorkSafe investigated and the company subsequently pleaded guilty to a charge laid under the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 for failing to ensure the safety of its workers, specifically by exposing them to the risk of a frame falling. The offence is punishable by a fine of up to $1.5million.
After Mr Edwards death, Affco decommissioned the freezer and replaced it at a cost of about $25 million.
Judge Cathcart had reserved his decision after a hearing earlier this month, saying he needed more time to consider the company’s culpability.
He initially assessed it as being higher than either WorkSafe or the company’s lawyer Tim Clarke suggested.
Delivering the decision yesterday, the judge set a sentence starting point of $750,000, saying the company’s culpability was high. Mr Edwards’ death was a “wholly avoidable event”. The judge’s starting point was $50,000 more than the upper end of the range WorkSafe suggested and $150,000 more than what Mr Clarke had submitted.
The judge increased the starting point by $67,500 in recognition of Affco’s previous convictions and allowed a 42 percent reduction for mitigating factors.
The end fine was $502,500.
The court formally approved payments the company had made to the family of just over $139,000 for emotional harm and abut $84,500 for consequential loss. The company was directed to pay about $5500 in prosecutor’s costs.
In his finding as to Affco’s culpability, Judge Cathcart said the company had identified two other risks associated with the movement of cartons in the chiller but claimed not to have identified the specific risk of the steel frames possibly falling. But that made its position worse, the judge said, “because knowledge of the first two risks would likely lead a prudent operator to recognise the third risk as obvious”.
“By failing to identify that specific risk Affco was, in my view — at the very least — grossly careless,” Judge Cathcart said.
Affco accepted that workers shouldn’t have been able to access the dangerous area at the back of the north blast without restriction. But when asked what, other than decommissioning the freezer, could have been done to prevent access and protect workers like Mr Edwards, Mr Clarke had struggled to point to any preventative step that could have eliminated, not merely minimised, the risk, the judge said.
Administrative controls may have helped or reduced the risk, but not removed the serious risk of exposure to this hazard. Affco conceded that it was not possible to fit the same engineering controls as were implemented on the other freezers.
“In my view, nothing short of decommissioning the north blast was adequate here. I rejected therefore the submission (by Mr Clarke) that decommission was simply the “best way” going forward. Any lesser options constituted non-viable alternatives under the Act here.
Decommission of the north blast was the only viable option. Affco ought to have done that years ago,” Judge Cathcart said.
Discussing the company’s previous convictions, the judge said Affco had 12 convictions for health and safety matters but only four were within the past 10 years. Only one of the previous related to the Wairoa site — an incident in 2002 when a worker’s fingers were crushed while he was attempting to relocate the frame of a brace stunner.
The company had been operating in New Zealand since 1904 and employs more than 3750 workers over 12 sites, Wairoa being one of its largest with more than 600 workers. The scale of Affco’s business was therefore relevant, as was the fact that the industry itself was inherently dangerous, the judge said.
Mr Edwards is survived by his wife Teena — a fellow meatworker —with whom they had five children and whangai’ed another two.
WorkSafe has identified poor risk management and a lack of worker engagement as crucial factors in Affco Wairoa freezing worker Alfred Edwards’ death.
The fatality is another in a series of health and safety incidents that have caused WorkSafe to take a closer look in recent years at the Talley’s group of companies.
Mr Edwards, 61, was alone in the back end of a blast freezer when he was crushed under a steel frame full of cartons that suddenly fell on him.
In a statement released after the company’s sentencing, WorkSafe said its investigation into the incident found the company was aware cartons had jammed previously, and the freezer had not been maintained to modern safety standards.
While Affco said the freezer was only used intermittently, the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 applies to anywhere work is carried out, regardless of how often.
“Affco had overarching health and safety procedures, but they weren’t applied in practice. Having a written process but not following it is the same as having nothing at all,” WorkSafe’s head of specialist interventions, Dr Catherine Gardner said.
Following the death, Affco decommissioned the freezer.
“The investigation also found management didn’t spend enough time talking to workers on the job, to hear about and fix any safety issues with this machine. Doing so could have averted this tragedy.
“Mr Edwards was described as a man with mana who has left a huge void. The death has been devastating for his immediate whānau, and the small Wairoa community,” Dr Gardner said.
Affco is owned by Talley’s Group Limited. Since July 2021, WorkSafe has been taking a close look at Talley’s Group of companies, due to a history of serious health and safety incidents.
WorkSafe has finalised the monitoring and measurement approach it will take with Talley’s to make sure changes are enacted and followed, with monitoring continuing for some time.
“Talley’s has acknowledged improvements were needed and has been proactively engaged throughout WorkSafe’s interaction with them,” says Dr Gardner.
“We’re being as thorough as possible in order to shift Talley’s health and safety culture in a meaningful way that creates lasting change, and keeps people healthy and safe.”
Senior doctors at Gisborne Hospital will strike for 24 hours on Thursday.