17 April 2025

As winter creeps closer, WorkSafe New Zealand is reminding businesses to take heed of the risks when workers are operating at height.

The consequences have been laid bare at the sentencing of a Wellington business, whose worker was critically injured in April 2023 when he fell six metres from a slippery, unsafe rooftop.

38-year-old Josh Bowles had only been in his job for two months and had no experience or training in working at height when he fell from a commercial rooftop in central Wellington. He spent six months in hospital recovering from a traumatic brain injury and multiple broken bones. The father of five still lives with continuous pain, and has been unable to work since the fall.

A WorkSafe investigation found there was only limited edge protection to the roofline. In its absence, a harness system should have been used to keep workers safe but was not. Regardless, Mr Bowles had no formal training on use of a harness or roof-anchors.

The business, Prowash, did not properly manage the risks of working in rainy conditions on a new iron roof with cleaning product on it. Prowash was unable to provide WorkSafe with any policies, or risk/hazard identification and control process, to prove it had a safe system of work in place.

“This was a preventable fall which has permanently impacted a young father’s quality of life and job prospects,” says WorkSafe principal inspector, Paul Budd.

“Falls from height are a well-known risk and there is no excuse for not putting proper protections in place – especially in bad weather. If the work needs to be postponed until conditions are more favourable, then do so.

“The best controls are those that don’t require active judgement by a worker. This includes solutions such as edge protection or scaffolding. If a worker slips or missteps, as we saw in this case, there is a physical barrier between themselves and the ground below,” says Paul Budd.

Businesses must manage their risks and where they don’t WorkSafe will take action. This is part of WorkSafe’s role to influence businesses to meet their responsibilities and keep people healthy and safe.

Read the good practice guidelines for working on roofs

Background 

• Prowash Wellington Limited was sentenced at Wellington District Court on 15 April 2025
• A fine of $40,000 was imposed, and reparations of $77,456 ordered
• Prowash was charged under sections 36(1)(a), 48(1) and (2)(c) of the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015
  • Being a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU), having a duty to ensure, so far as reasonably practicable, the health and safety of workers who work for the PCBU, including Joshua Bowles, while the workers are at work, namely while carrying out work on the roof of 258 Taranaki Street, Wellington, did fail to comply with that duty, and that failure exposed workers to a risk of death or serious injury from a fall from height.
• The maximum penalty is a fine not exceeding $1.5 million.