Occupational health and safety (OHS) laws establish duties on employers (and employees) to provide safe and healthy workplaces. These duties reflect the social morals of the time, but the morality of employers is rarely challenged. Below is a selection of OHS-related questions that all employers should be asked and able to answer. How would you …
American legal scholar Cass R. Sunstein does not write about occupational health and safety (OHS) directly, but he writes about the society in which OHS operates. In November 2022, he reviewed an economics book in an article called “Accounting for the Human Cost.” OHS may have a strong moral core, but one can argue that …
Workplace psychological health has been dominated by wellness advocates for several decades. Occupational health and safety (OHS) is seen by many as an interloper with “new” regulations that impose rules, expectations, notifications, and records on a corporate wellness sector that has been hugely influential on employers’ perspectives of mental health at work. This interjection by …
Jennifer Moss is a prominent analyst on work-related burnout and mental health. She is one of the few receiving global attention for pointing out that the prevention and control of the burgeoning mental health crisis are best addressed by reassessing and redesigning how organisations are run and workers are managed. Her latest book, due out … Continue reading “Burnout prevention to receive considerable media attention”
Australia has learned much from its consideration of psychosocial factors that can generate psychological harm in workers over the last decade. By the end of 2025, all Australian jurisdictions will likely have re-emphasised the psychological elements of employers’ and workers’ occupational health and safety (OHS) duties. However, the legislative changes are likely to fail to …
In December 2024, WorkSafe Victoria released “Office Health and Safety – A Guide for Employers“. Sadly, it seems to have (half) dumped the Officewise brand. If WorkSafe had kept it, the guide would have been part of an illustrious history stretching to the last century when the first edition was published in 1995. The new …
Psychological injuries that happen at work or are caused by work may need to be notified to occupational health and safety (OHS) regulators in some Australian jurisdictions. Recently, an organisation associated with prominent Australian businessman Andrew Forrest underwent the notification experience and received an improvement notice....
