communication – Page 52 – SafetyAtWorkBlog

OHS law debate and Law Society position

Boardroom Radio has hosted a very interesting podcast between two labour lawyers, Andrew Douglas and Michael Tooma, with the participation of Barry Silburn, the National President of the Safety Institute of Australia.

Andrew Douglas speaking at one of his firm's regular breakfast seminars

The SIA National President’s contributions were quite narrow, dominated by the issue of “suitably qualified” in the new model OHS laws (but he did struggle to get a word in edge ways).

It will be disappointing if the SIA’s submission to the Federal Government on the new laws focusses on this single and, to most, secondary issue, when the institute could achieve better results through other mechanisms and more creative thinking.

The only expansive comment from Silburn was the fact that harmonised plant regulations that were introduced over 10 years ago still resulted in different legislation in each State even though they reflected a common core. The high likelihood of this happening to the general OHS legislation was supported by the over panel members.

It is possible that the argy-bargy occurring now and at least for the next 6 weeks of public comment, will not achieve harmonisation as it was initially intended, and tried in a half-hearted way in the early 1990’s. The Federal Government could still end the debate by applying its powers under the Corporations Act, as it has in industrial relations. Some lawyers believe that this is the ace up the sleeve of the Federal Government.

The Law Council of Australia issued an interesting media statement on 30 September 2009. Below are the comments from that statement by John Corcoran, the Council’s President:

“The model laws strike the correct balance and adhere to fundamental criminal law principles. Governments must set aside jurisdictional differences and enact a uniform model OH&S law.”

“Despite the substantial differences in OH&S legislation across Australia, there is little evidence to suggest that the imposition of harsher penalties and evidentiary burdens in some jurisdictions has improved workplace safety performance. Nor has it been improved by the extension of prosecution powers to unions or other organisations.”

“There are undeniable benefits, both to workers and employers, in a uniform national OH&S system, but there is no evidence that workers in any jurisdiction will be worse off if a model law is adopted uniformly.”

These quotes give one of the clearest indications that the OHS harmonisation process about law and not safety management.

It could also be asked that if there is “little evidence to suggest that the imposition of harsher penalties and evidentiary burdens in some jurisdictions has improved workplace safety performance” what alternative strategies and penalties would the Council suggest for consideration? We will need to wait for their submission to the government for that.

Richard Johnstone, a leading academic and researcher into OHS law and enforcement polices argued in his 2003 book, “Occupational Heath and Safety, Courts and Crime”

“…that the court is an institution which, while appearing to dispense justice, is actually part of a broader process which decontextualises social issues. Courts, inspectors, prosecutors and defence counsel are involved in filtering or reshaping OHS issues during the prosecution process, both pre-trial and in court.”

Johnstone says that the process leads to a focus on the “event” rather than the broader context which includes the workplace management systems.

Johnstone succinctly lists the five key principles of effective OHS management, based on his work and that of his colleagues:

“demonstrated senior management commitment to OHS;

the integration of OHS management into core management and work activities;

the adoption of a systems approach to OHS management, involving risk assessment processes and an audit system to identify all risks and to determine which require urgent attention;

the ability of the OHS management system to accommodate to change, particularly changes to work methods, systems and processes, changes to substances, plant and equipment, and changes to the workforce; and

valuing worker input to the OHS management system.”

This is the context in which the new draft Model OHS laws should be considered. If the law does not support these principles than the law is being written for the lawyers and not for the improvement of safety for workers in Australia.

Much of the podcast discussion was about how one deals with what went wrong rather than providing guidance of how to manage to avoid the risk in the first place – the perpetual dichotomy between lawyers and safety professionals.

Kevin Jones

Safety Institute gets a seat at the OHSAC table

SafetyAtWorkBlog has been informed that the current CEO of the Safety Institute of Australia (SIA), Gary Lawson-Smith, has accepted an invitation to join the WorkSafe Victoria’s OHS Advisory Committee (OHSAC), as a representative of the SIA. This is a terrific win for the SIA as it adds a degree of legitimacy to the organisation’s developing professionalism.

Lawson-Smith has had a long administrative role in the airline and air safety sectors and was a Carlton footballer for a short time. He has no formal OHS qualifications but an OHS qualification is not a prerequisite for OHSAC.

Also, it is understood that the OHSAC position is conditional on Lawson-Smith keeping the CEO role with the SIA. If he leaves, the SIA could nominate someone else for the role. SafetyAtWorkBlog notes that Lawson-Smith had advised the SIA National Board previously that he was not renewing his contract at the end of 2009 but he is believed to have been talked out of this decision.

Several other OHSAC appointments have also been rumoured. It is understood that the “tenure” of one of the two independent representatives, both who have been on the committee since its inception, has not been renewed. It seems odd that one independent representative is “let go” and the other retained. It would be interesting to know the reasons for departures from the Committee as much as the reasons for new members.

Whether the SIA appointment is a direct replacement is unclear. Whether the SIA is to be one of the two independent representatives (as required under the Victorian OHS Act 2004 (Division 6 Section 19) is also unclear.

The Act requires

“2 independent persons who the Minister considers have appropriate expertise and experience in occupational health and safety”

The SIA Victoria Division has a number of very prominent OHS academics and practitioners but, even though OHSAC reports to a Victorian administrative agency, it is understood that the Victorian WorkCover Minister, Tim Holding’s, letter was to the Safety Institute’s CEO, a national position.

Prominent ergonomist, Professor David Caple, is an independent OHSAC member well known to SafetyAtWorkBlog. Caple takes his advisory role seriously by encouraging Australian safety professionals to raise any OHS concerns with him so that he may be able to provide a broader experiential context to some of the WorkSafe Board’s initiatives. He makes an annual appearance at the Central Safety Group in Victoria to encourage a broad range of input.

One of OHSAC’s legislative functions is to

“to enquire into and report to the Authority’s Board of Management on any matters referred to it by the Board in accordance with the terms of reference given by the Board; and

advise the Board in relation to:

Promoting health and safe working environments: and

The operation and administration of this [OHS] Act and the regulations…”

The significant element of OHSAC is that it is only reactive to the WorkCover Board. If the Board does not seek opinions, effectively, OHSAC has nothing to do. The Victorian Trades Hall Council, in its 2008 submission to the Model OHS Law Review, expressed great concern about OHSAC

“The Occupational Health and Safety Advisory Committee (OHSAC) is established by s 19 of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (OHSA 2004). However, this body has limited functions and no reporting line to the Minister. Other than a specific role for OHSAC in the development of ARREO training, the OHSAC is limited to reporting to the Board on matters referred by the Board. It has no capacity to ‘set the agenda’.”

“The Committee has met only 9 times since March 2005 and other than resolving the training issues relating to ARREOs, which is a specific requirement of OHSA 2004, the Committee has not been given the opportunity to deal with any strategic issue in any meaningful way.”

“Decisions of the Board on OHS are not transparent. The Board operates without the involvement of key stakeholders and relies on the “good will” of the Chair and CEO to relay information to the Board and back to the OHSAC. It is unacceptable for decisions relating to the VWA as a regulator of OHS to be inaccessible to scrutiny.”

SafetyAtWorkBlog is always concerned about the transparency of organisations associated with the promotion of safety and there is very little public information available about OHSAC. Even the membership of the committee is taking SafetyAtWorkBlog some time to put together. This may be due to the committee membership being updated, as indicated by the SIA’s inclusion, but even the previous committee membership is proving hard to collate form public sources.

The issue of transparency and communication is directly relevant to the OHSAC participation of the Safety Institute of Australia. SafetyAtWorkBlog has heard that all committee representatives of the SIA, nationally and divisionally, are obliged to sign a Deed of Confidentiality. Whether this applies to the SIA’s CEO is unclear as Gary Lawson-Smith is not listed as an official member on the National Board.

Some would assert that even if OHSAC did report to OHS stakeholders and members of the OHSAC representatives, they do not do anything of real interest.

The concerns over OHSAC are not restricted to Trades Hall, one of the few public members of OHSAC. Parliamentarian Bob Stensholt undertook an administrative review of the 2004 OHS Act and expressed the following thoughts about OHSAC:

“Although I note WorkSafe’s comments that OHSAC has not been frequently required to consider key strategic issues because they have not arisen, I am of the view that the Committee is not operating as well as it could be. There is a lack of conviction regarding the potential effectiveness of OHSAC from all stakeholders. This impedes the Committee’s ability to work effectively as a representative stakeholder group.”

“It seems OHSAC has primarily been treated as an ‘information sharing’ committee by WorkSafe. I do not believe this is what was intended by Parliament when the Bill became law. Rather than merely providing OHSAC with its business plan for any particular financial year after it has been settled (for example), WorkSafe should also be prepared to engage OHSAC on key strategic issues as they arise in the rolling out of Strategy 2012, rather than just providing the Committee with updates as to how Strategy 2012 is tracking. A primary consideration for WorkSafe in making OHSAC more effective should be to ensure it adopts”

If the WorkCover Minister, Tim Holding, is reviewing the membership of OHSAC in response to some of these concerns, his action is to be applauded, but, at the moment, OHSAC looks ineffective and of limited use.

The Victorian Government’s response to the Stensholt report referred Stensholt’s recommendations on OHSAC to the Victorian WorkCover Authority’s Board of Management for consideration. OHSAC works to the direction of this very Board.

Gaining a seat at the OHSAC table remains a major feather in the cap of the SIA and the years of lobbying undertaken by a number of SIA officials should not be dismissed. The size of the feather in the cap, however, depends on who one talks to.

Kevin Jones

Alarming statistics on young workers and compensation

Safe Work Australia has issued some important statistical reports on workplace injury statistics. One statistic, in particular, stood out:

“…young workers aged 15 to 24 incurred much higher rates of injury than other age groups and were the least likely to apply for workers compensation”

The injury statistic is not surprising and is consistent with other data but why are young workers “least likely to apply for workers compensation”? Are they unaware of their rights? Do they work in a situation where claiming compensation is taboo? Is illiteracy a deterrent? Has their employer deterred them from applying? Is their type of work illegal, casual, or in the black market?

SafetyAtWorkBlog asked Safe Work Australia, if not through workers compensation, how are young people funding their medical/rehabilitation costs. A spokesperson provided the following non-age specific response:

“We are unable to provide an answer to this question as the data has not been analysed separately by age.

However, the last section of the report on workers’ compensation applications shows the various forms of financial assistance that all injured workers used.

For all injured workers, 34% received workers’ compensation, 39% did not access any financial assistance (these were mostly injuries involving no time lost from work) and the remaining 27% did access some form of assistance. Within this latter group regular sick leave was the most common.

Of the injured employees who did not access workers’ compensation, 18% used their regular sick leave, 9% accessed Medicare or other social security benefits, 7% had costs paid by their employer, 5% used other resources such as money from family and friends while 4% access private health insurance or income protection insurance.

Respondents to the survey could select more than one response to this question.”

Inverting some of these stats raises some concerns. (Please note that statistics is not the strongest skill of SafetyAtWorkBlog, so please correct any issues through the comments section below).

For all injured workers, 66% did not receive workers compensation. This should be a big red flag to OHS regulators and deserves more analysis.

Of the 66% over half (57%) funded their injuries without recourse to health insurance, sick leave, employer contributions, support from family or friends, Medicare or social security. Expanding the young worker question above to workers generally, how are these injured workers funding their rehabilitation from outside the regulated and social support mechanisms?

Some years ago SafetyAtWorkBlog attended an international conference on OHS. There were many people at this Melbourne conference who spoke about the Asian and African countries where injured workers must rely on family, or other social security mechanisms, for an income, as workers’ compensation was non-existent. This is one element of economic integration into the Asian region that Australia should not be tolerating.

A spokesperson for Safe Work Australia told SafetyAtWorkBlog (read slowly as there are numbers involved):

“The survey estimated that 689,500 workers were injured at work during 2005-06. Of these, 625,900 were employees and hence eligible for workers’ compensation. However, 388,100 did not apply for compensation and 23,800 applied but did not receive compensation.

This means that 66% of injured employees did not receive compensation. While this equates to 60% of injured workers not receiving compensation it is not correct to use this figure as 12% of workers were not eligible for it.

Looking only at the 411 900 injured employees who did not apply for workers’ compensation

75,700 accessed regular sick leave

30,100 had their employer pay their costs

35,500 used Medicare/social security

18,200 used private health insurance/ income protection insurance, and

18,700 accessed money from other sources such as family and friends.

Please note that when looking at these figures that 42% of injuries involved no time off from work and hence costs would be very small.

Analysis of additional data from the survey, that has not been included in this round of reports shows that over 60% of injured workers aged 15 to 24 felt their injury was too minor to claim or that they felt it was not necessary to claim. This is double the percentage for all workers. While this may sound like young people had more minor injuries, this is not the case. Young workers had the same proportion of injuries that involved no time off work as the workforce as a whole and the same proportion that involved longer periods of time off from work.”

The last paragraph cycles this article back to the start.

“….over 60% of injured workers aged 15 to 24 felt their injury was too minor to claim or that they felt it was not necessary to claim. This is double the percentage for all workers.“

There is something missing from how OHS is promoted to young workers. The quote above indicates that young workers know about OHS but do not understand OHS. But that’s not something that can be provided in a 30 minute TV ad, a medium that young people are increasingly less interested in.

Perhaps, we should be spending less time telling people not to stick their hands in a guillotine and more time empowering them in their workplace rights.

Kevin Jones

Safety signs – fact and fiction

A while ago I had a gig where one of the aspects of the job was researching how safety signs work, are read and responded to. Here’s a snapshot of some facts and fiction about safety signs.

Fact: If people don’t know the reason for a safety sign, they will probably ignore it. A safety sign needs to be seen as a reminder about a danger and the associated injury precautions that should already have been discussed at a safety meeting or included in training. Workers need to understand the relevancy of a safety sign, and that includes getting info on what the danger really is. A related issue is that research on how people respond to road signs found that likelihood of being hurt is a big factor in whether people take notice of a sign.* It’s reasonable to conclude there is a nexus with how people respond to safety signs generally; just telling people what to do is not enough, knowledge is essential.

Fiction: A safety warning sign is sometimes all that’s needed to cover the safety problem.

Fact: A safety warning sign is never enough to control a danger. If you’ve done nothing more than put up a warning sign to control a risk, it’s odds on you will be breaking the law. Don’t look at a warning sign as the end of the issue; look at it as the indicator that you know there is a safety problem in an area and that special safety precautions are needed and are in place. That’s exactly how the OH&S enforcement agency sees them. That latter point is worth thinking about if your workplace is a place that plasters safety signs up everywhere but doesn’t deliver on actual risk controls.

Fiction: The sign is permanent, so is the message.

Fact: Safety signs should be changed, repositioned and even re-coloured every now and then to make them noticeable. That old, grime covered sign plonked up on the wall becomes invisible eventually. People get used to seeing a sign, and the message stops registering. Try revitalising how the safety messages work. Try ways to get people to “connect” with their safety signs. One thing worth trying is to get staff to have a go at spraying up the safety message themselves. Use the key words on a commercially available sign, but let staff “funk it up” and get creative. That will make the sign more noticeable, more “real” – a very good thing. If producing a sign from scratch doesn’t suit, use customised sign options provided by most commercial sign suppliers.

Col Finnie
col@finiohs.com

* There’s a wealth of useful information in the 1998 research paper titled “Signs of trouble to come? A behavioural assessment of the effectiveness of road warning signs – Final Report”, Austin Adams, Jim Bright, Ben Searle, School of Psychology, The University of New South Wales.

SafetyAtWorkBlog gets praise for independence

Today, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) released a four-page document criticising the campaigning techniques and statistical foundation of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU). Nothing unique in that ideological battle, however, what grabbed our attention was that SafetyAtWorkBlog is mentioned specifically.

I contacted the ACCI this morning and thanked them for reading the blog and for describing SafetyAtWorkBlog as a “respected website”. We’ll accept praise from anyone as our major indicator of success mainly comes from the steady increase in our readership statistics.

The ACCI makes considerable mileage out of a SafetyAtWorkBlog article that discusses the survey results that the ACTU released in support of some of its campaigning for further changes in the national OHS laws that are currently being drafted.

Several comments are useful in relation to the ACCI paper

SafetyAtWorkBlog obtained the survey results by requesting them through the ACTU and being provided them by Essential Media. We have a policy on any media releases that quote statistics. If the statistics are not readily available, or at least the relevant OHS parts of survey results, we do not usually report on the issues raised or we make a point of stating that the statistical assertions are not able to be verified.

The ACCI paper echoes many of the points raised in the blog article. Our main point was to question the wisdom of using statistics as support for a campaign when the statistics do not, necessarily, support the campaign objectives, or, in the least, may provide alternative interpretations.

The Essential Media report provided to SafetyAtWorkBlog could have been more detailed and the ACCI certainly wants more than we have seen. Releasing such a paper criticising the ACTU for not sharing research data puts the ACCI in a position now where it cannot deny the public release of its research data, at least, on matters relevant to OHS. The questions from ACCI have set a precedent for openness and information sharing.

Whether marching in the streets in support of an OHS campaign is effective, or warranted, or not is almost a moot point. Many of the televisions stations covered the union marches in Australia earlier this week. The 7.30 Report felt there was enough of a profile raised by the union campaign that it followed up many of the concerns raised with a long article in its show on 8 September 2009. The media exposure has been able to further raise the profile of OHS as a contentious issue that is being acted upon by government. It should raise the “seven out of ten” OHS awareness factor, quoted by the ACCI, a few points at least.

Given the criticism of the ACTU, one could genuinely ask, how the ACCI is increasing awareness of OHS matters in the community as well as its membership? It is not expected out in the streets but the occasional media release or four-page rebuttal does not have the same affect as a march of hundreds of people on the television.

In all of this to-ing and fro-ing, SafetyAtWorkBlog takes pride in its independence and as a forum for expressing views on a social and industrial issue that has only ever before been discussed by political ideologues from fixed perspectives.

Perhaps safety professionals could apply the wisdom of Oscar Wilde to safety

“The only thing worse than being talked about is not being talked about.”

It seems to me that OHS has not been talked about for far too long.

Kevin Jones

Safety industry jargon

Every industry has jargon. A common language and common terms can build companionship and solidarity. But when used outside a “discipline” it reduces the effectiveness of communication. The mis-application of jargon can generate confusion and is, in many areas, being purposely used to hide meanings. Sadly in the safety profession, jargon is used to mask the inadequacies of professionals in many circumstances.

Below is an example of the (lack of) communication that recently did the rounds in Australia:

“…. partnership to assist in facilitating a more holistic approach to our (OHS) profession along the lines of more clear, established and disciplined paths and requirements to progress those paths.”

I would suggest this would translate as “someone has given us money so that we can do things”.

A very good blog article on current “business-speak” is available online.

Please send in your examples of safety-related nonsense that you may have found in mission statements, annual reports or other documents.

Kevin Jones

Wriedt provides context of her depression

Former Tasmanian MP, Paul Wriedt, has provided an Australian Sunday newspaper with a long article that provides the context for her suicide attempt, depression and career implosion. The full article is well worth reading and shows the combination of factors that led to her suicide attempt.

Excessive workload is mentioned several times and, although it is only one of the confluence of factors, the workloads and working hours of politicians remain untreated elements of the health and wellbeing of important social p0licy decision-makers.

If, as many safety advocates profess, safety is led from the top, politicians are doing the safety profession a disservice by not structuring their work environments and schedules to ensure a healthy workplace.

One point is not mentioned in the article. Paula Wriedt is a spokesperson for beyondblue, the most prominent depression-related organisation in Australian. In fact Ms Wriedt is one of the organisation’s recent “ambassadors”.

Beyondblue has advised SafetyAtWorkBlog that the Sunday Herald-Sun article was Ms Wriedt’s own work and that beyondblue was not aware of the article before publication.

The beyondblue spokesperson said that the organisation is expanding its pool of ambassadors which should be of particular interest to those working in the workplace health sector. Ambassadors operate on a volunteer basis and may be eligible for the reimbursement of costs in specific circumstances.

[Hm, voluntary ambassadors lobbying on behalf of a health issue on a voluntary basis. Perhaps the safety profession could offer a similar “outreach program”]

Ms Wriedt was not obliged to mention beyondblue in the article and it is clear that she sees public discussion on depression issues to be one of her own career goals, but it would have been appropriate to mention her relationship, particularly as she is a beyondblue ambassador.

Kevin Jones

Category: communication

OHS law debate and Law Society position

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Safety Institute gets a seat at the OHSAC table

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Alarming statistics on young workers and compensation

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Safety signs – fact and fiction

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SafetyAtWorkBlog gets praise for independence

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Safety industry jargon

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Wriedt provides context of her depression

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