A court has slapped the company that runs The Beer Store with a $175,000 fine after a worker died after drinking windshield washer fluid in a bottle mislabelled as liquor.

The Ministry of Labour says two workers washing delivery trucks at the Beer Store's distribution centre in Brampton northwest of
Toronto in April 2012 found a liquor bottle filled with blue liquid.

It says the workers took turns drinking from the bottle, which held methanol windshield washing fluid used in the trucks with one of them then taking the container home and finishing it off.

The ministry says that worker later died from methanol poisoning.

The province says Brewers Retail Inc. pleaded guilty under the workplace safety law to failing to acquaint a worker with a hazard
in the handling, storage or use of a liquid chemical agent.