Car Festivals Pty Ltd

Incident

On Sunday 3 September 2017, 14 spectators received serious burn injuries during a burnout competition at the Red CentreNATS. Car Festivals Pty Ltd is the event coordinator for the Red CentreNATS.

Alleged breach

It was alleged that Car Festivals Pty Ltd failed to comply with health and safety duties under Sections 19, 38 and 39 of the Work Health Safety (National Uniform Legislation) Act 2011 (the Act) and its obligations under the Work Health Safety (National Uniform Legislation) Regulations 2011.

Summary of work health and safety undertaking

An undertaking given by Car Festivals Pty Ltd in relation to the alleged contraventions has been accepted by the Regulator as an enforceable undertaking under Part 11 of the Act.

Car Festivals Pty Ltd has committed to a range of activities to improve health and safety in the workplace and deliver health and safety initiatives to the wider community. These activities include:

• Workers to become Confederation of Australian Motor Sport (CAMS) accredited track officials. This accreditation will include the Clerk of the Course, Scrutineer, Event Secretary and General Officials;
• Training to RCN04 provided to 120 paid and unpaid workers;
• CAMS sanctioning event by having drivers licensed and insured by CAMS. Licenses to be paid by Car Festivals;
• Motorsports and Burnout Safety Seminars to be held in Alice Springs and Canberra during Red CentreNats and SummerNats to improve safety at these events;
• Harmonization of burnout rules and safety. There is no governing body that manages the sport of burnouts and there are different sets of rules across Australia. This commitment will facilitate a consistent approach to regulating the sport;
• Burnout Personal Protective Equipment - through purchase of extra fire suits and provide free to burnout competitions within Australia;
• Safety mentoring to the Burnout Association of Darwin to ensure their own safe burnout events. This includes providing a safety officer to undertake risk assessment and create safety documentation, face to face training and event ready workshops. Including the gifting of 10 double layer fire suits to the Burnout Association of Darwin;
• Car Festivals will engage the Central Australia Drag Racing Association (CADRA) who are the operators of the Alice Springs Inland Dragway (ASID) to work with them on the management and delivery of burnout events at ASID. This includes providing a safety officer to undertake risk assessment and create safety documentation, face to face training and event ready workshops. Including the gifting of 10 double layer fire suits to the CADRA;
• Additional training and supervision of volunteers from the Alice Springs Motorsport Fire and Rescue Team. This will be provided by the most experience fire and rescue crew in Australia and will be conducted pre-event and includes event support and review.
• The amount spent on work health and safety activities following the incident was approximately $27,500 (not included below).

The financial commitment of the activities proposed in the undertaking are:

• workers or the workplace – $30,720;
• industry - $157,000, and
• the community - $67,400.

The financial commitments to the undertaking have a total minimum expenditure of $255,120.

Reasons for regulator acceptance

The regulator accepted the WHS undertaking under section 216 of the Act and is satisfied that this undertaking offers significant and ongoing commitments to achieve improved work health and safety outcomes and compliance beyond what is required by the law. The regulator believes the WHS undertaking offers a similar deterrent to a successful legal proceeding and will result in a tangible improvement to safety in the workplace, industry and in the Northern Territory community.

NT WorkSafe has commenced monitoring the enforceable undertaking to ensure the activities are implemented and will continue to do so until the undertaking is completely discharged.