Vineyard fined for worker’s quad bike injury

2 May 2013

Vineyard fined for worker’s quad bike injury

Craggy Range vineyard in Martinborough has been fined $36,000 after a contract worker was injured in a quad bike accident on 12 May this year.

The company was also ordered to pay $6500 in reparations to the worker when it appeared in the Masterton District Court today. The company pleaded guilty to the charge brought by the Health and Safety Group of the Ministry.

The contract worker was one of two passengers sitting on the rear of the quad bike and as it drove forwards, he fell under a wheel of a trailer it was towing, breaking his arm.

“The circumstances of this accident directly contravene a critical piece of advice provided by the quad bike manufacturer and by the Ministry’s quad bike harm reduction programme – these machines are not designed to carry passengers,” said Wairarapa Service Manager Dave Hulston.

“The owner’s manual states clearly never to carry passengers and the same statement is on a mudguard notice, yet it appears carrying passengers like this was common practice at the vineyard.

“Craggy Range has changed its procedures since this accident and now specifically prohibits carrying passengers, but if the company had met its obligations in the first place, this worker would not have broken his arm.

“It is so easy to do the right thing to protect workers on quad bikes. Manufacturers and the Ministry provide simple, easily accessible advice and there are too many avoidable accidents because that advice is not being heeded. The Ministry will take enforcement action wherever it finds breaches.”

Craggy Range Ltd pleaded guilty to a charge laid under section 18 of the Health and Safety in Employment Act:

18 Duties of principals
(1) Every principal shall take all practicable steps to ensure that—
• no employee of a contractor or subcontractor; and
• if an individual, no contractor or subcontractor,—
is harmed while doing any work (other than residential work) that the contractor was engaged to do.
(2) Subsection (1) shall be read subject to section 2(2).

For more information on the Ministry’s quad bike harm reduction programme, go to: http://dol.govt.nz/quad-bikes/index.asp

ENDS

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