Lose a finger in an industrial accident in Victoria and the company can face prosecution and a fine of $30,000. But lose your life in the ACT and a fine of around $30,000 applies - as it did in the three workplace deaths in the territory successfully prosecuted in the past decade.

The introduction of the ACT's first industrial magistrate this year cannot come soon enough for the friends and families of workers killed or injured on the job - particularly given the territory's low level of fines relating to industrial manslaughter, safety failures and negligence when compared with the other states and territory.

ACT WorkSafe Commissioner Mark McCabe said the fact that only the ACT and Tasmania did not have specialist industrial courts to deal with work safety prosecutions could go some way to help explain the disparity.

''It's hard to understand why a finger is worth the same amount as a life depending on whether the accident happened in the ACT or Victoria. It is a shocking comparison when you look at it and very cold comfort to the families of the loved one,'' Mr McCabe said.

He was hopeful that the ACT court system would soon produce much more substantial fines under new national occupational health and safety harmonisation laws, which allow a company to be fined up to $3 million for a serious safety breach, and a negligent company director to be fined up to $600,000 or sent to jail for five years. While these penalties were enacted at the start of 2012, they have yet to be tested due to the lag in cases reaching prosecution.

Mr McCabe said WorkSafe currently had a backlog of 12 cases - including the four high-profile construction industry deaths that took place between 2011-12. These deaths, combined with a serious injury rate that is nearly double the national average, make the ACT the most dangerous jurisdiction in which to work in construction.

Mr McCabe said it was likely the ACT would see new record fines handed down when some of the most serious cases reached the court.

Fines differ to civil claims for compensation following an accident. While companies usually have insurance to cover damages, they must pay fines from company profits. Mr McCabe is very confident that large fines would be a deterrent for companies cutting corners with safety.

An industrial magistrate also offered hope that the lag time between an accident occurring and the company facing court could be reduced as it created a single court for all workplace cases under a specialist magistrate - along the same model as the Children's Court.

Some cases prosecuted in the ACT since WorkSafe was established in 2002 have taken more than 6½ years to reach a conclusion. Very few have been resolved in under two years.

Mr McCabe, who in last month's budget received a $5.7 million boost to his inspectorate including specialist legal staff to prosecute cases, said he would hope to increase WorkSafe's current case load from three to four cases each year to up to a dozen.

This would depend, however, on whether the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions - which has received a budget cut of $110,000 - could staff the actual prosecutions.

Mr McCabe said fines needed to exceed the level of liquidated damages companies were liable to pay if they did not meet a construction deadline - which on some jobs amounted to $30,000 per day for every day the project was late.

The most recent fine, handed down in February after nearly 3½ years winding through the court system, was $15,000 for K-Form Structural Systems after it was found responsible for the concrete slab collapse in 2008 at the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations building in Marcus Clarke Street, Civic.

Mr McCabe said the company would have been facing liquidated damages of up to twice the fine amount for every day that the project was late.

''We are talking about liquidated damages of tens of thousands of dollars per day on the big projects, so you have to wonder if the imposed fine for cutting a corner is likely to be so small, why wouldn't they risk it?''