In honour of Professor Michael Quinlan, renowned academic in the field of workplace health and safety, a symposium was held in September 2018 at the University of New South Wales to mark his recent retirement. OHS scholars, some of whom had worked with Michael over many years, came from all over the world to attend. Elizabeth Humphrys and I were honoured to have the opportunity to present some of the results of our West Gate research to this audience of safety experts.

One element of our research is aimed at revisiting the final Royal Commission into the Failure of the West Gate Bridge report. Outside the engineering discipline, the West Gate Bridge disaster has been little studied, leaving unanswered important questions about the organisational context surrounding the tragedy. While the commissioners found that there were a number of problems with the construction process, including poor engineering practices, design flaws, and fragmented managerial oversight, we take issue with their assertion that union-led industrial action on the site played a role in the collapse. Using Quinlan’s (2014) ‘ten pathways’ analysis, we critically examine factors that led to the West Gate Bridge disaster, calling into question the conservative and inadequate nature of the Royal Commission findings. 

A full version of the paper we presented will appear in an upcoming book of essays in honour of Professor Quinlan called The Regulation and Management of Workplace Health and Safety: Historical and Emerging Trends, to be published by Routledge.

Photo of Michael Quinlan is from the UNSW Business School website.