McLellan Freight Ltd to pay $735k over truck driver’s death

The Invercargill District Court.

A company that was found partially responsible for the death of a truck driver in Bluff will have to pay a total of $735,000.

McLellan Freight Ltd was found guilty of two charges under the Health and Safety at Work Act, and at the Invercargill District Court this morning, Judge Duncan Harvey ordered the company to pay $60,000 emotional harm reparation, $50,869 consequential loss reparation, a fine of $577,500 and costs of $41,658.

He took into account the company’s clean record and remorse.

The judge apologised to the victims for the delay in the court process and that sentencing had occurred more than six years after the accident.

He said nobody was to blame, but Covid-19 and other issues had led to unavoidable delays.

“This sentencing represents a long-awaited conclusion to a very long and very painful process,” he said.

“[The victim’s family] must feel as though the court system is hopelessly broken.”

On February 24, 2017, a reversing front-loader struck the victim while he was standing in a shared work area.

The names of the vehicle operator and victim are suppressed.

Today, the victim’s wife and two daughters told the court how his death had devastated them.

His eldest daughter was distressed that her father would not be able to walk her down the aisle or see her become a mother.

The youngest spoke about the night she found out about her father’s passing.

“My heart sank and shattered into pieces, this couldn’t be true,” she said

“My superhero just gone, my best friend just vanished... nobody will ever be the man my dad was.”

The Otago-based company used contracted truck drivers to transport palm kernel, an animal feed, from South Port to a shed in Bluff where the fatal accident took place.

The court heard that in the early hours of the morning, the victim had parked his truck in an unsafe position.

He got out of the vehicle to blow residual palm kernel off the back of his truck.

This job was often done by workers known as “spotters” but when they were not available, it became the job of the driver.

While the man was out of his truck, a front-loader in the shed reversed into him, resulting in his death.

The company had a document called “Bluff Operating Procedures” that included safety guidelines for workers.

Judge Harvey found that these guidelines were not adequately shared between other contracted companies.

He said if there had been a designated spotter at all times, the risk of accidents occurring would have been reduced.

He also said there were other steps McLellan Freight Ltd could have taken to keep their employees safer, such as having reversing cameras in the front-loaders and a line of cones to mark exactly where the trucks should park before unloading the palm kernel.

Two other companies which McLellan Freight Ltd contracted for trucks and drivers each pleaded guilty to a charge of not taking all practicable steps to ensure the health and safety of a worker.

Last year, Transport Services Southland Ltd (TSSL) and Herberts Transport Ltd were fined $212,000 and were ordered to pay costs of $1750.