A document oversight has caused further delays to a criminal case against an aged care home over one of the deadliest COVID-19 outbreaks.
St Basil's Home for the Aged faced Melbourne Magistrates Court on Wednesday, after being charged by WorkSafe with nine breaches of occupational health and safety legislation.
The home experienced one of the deadliest COVID-19 outbreaks in 2020, with 45 infected residents dying.
WorkSafe will allege St Basil's failed to require workers to wear personal protective equipment, after being notified that a worker had tested positive to COVID-19.
It will allege the home failed to properly train workers how to safely don and remove protective equipment, verify whether staff were competent using it, tell staff when it should be used and supervise its use.
A committal hearing had been due to begin on Wednesday, after being booked in nine months ago.
However, St Basil's barrister Conor O'Bryan applied for an adjournment after an oversight had left the defence without crucial documentation.
A coroner is separately investigating the 45 COVID-19 deaths at St Basil's, but this has been put on hold pending the outcome of the criminal case.
Mr O'Bryan said he applied to coroner for permission to access documents inside the brief of evidence, but was denied.
Those documents included an independent expert's evidence about St Basil's preparations for the COVID-19 outbreak, he said.
He asked Magistrate Jarrod Williams for an adjournment to the three-day committal hearing, to allow him time to speak to the coroner.
The prosecution opposed the adjournment, as the hearing had been booked in for nine months and family members of residents involved in the outbreak had attended court on Wednesday.
Mr Williams noted that the issue was an "oversight" by St Basil's lawyers, but agreed to adjourn the case for six weeks as the documents "go to the heart of the defence".
St Basil's will return to the court for a special mention on March 4.
