The annual Safety Institute of Australia (SIA) breakfast was held at the Melbourne offices of Herbert Smith Freehills (HSF). As has become a tradition, a spokesperson for WorkSafe Victoria was the feature presenter and this year that was the very recently appointed Executive Director of Health and Safety, Julie Nielsen. HSF’s Steve Bell also provided an update on OHS laws and national Work Health and Safety (WHS) changes.
One of the hottest occupational health and safety (OHS) issues at the moment is Industrial Manslaughter but this is just one aspect of the enforcement of OHS and prosecution for breaches. In June 2019 a two-day conference on OHS/WHS Prosecution and Enforcement is being held in Melbourne, Australia with a list of respected speakers who are prominent in Australian labour law circles.
The conference is more expensive than some other OHS conferences but the list of speakers is impressive and the theme could not be more topical. (A brochure is available for download) Until March 15 2019, Criterion Conferences is applying an Early Bird discount of $500 for each delegate. SafetyAtWorkBlog has negotiated a further discount applicable to Subscribers only.
At the
Occupational health and safety (OHS) is often about promises. Employees trust their bosses to provide them with a job and the employer promises to provide a workplace that is as safe as possible. There are also contractual policies which formalise OHS relationships between client and contractor. But OHS is more often about those more personal promises and expectations between the boss and the worker.
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The Coronial Finding in to the death of Jorge Castillo-Riffo is an important occupational health and safety (OHS) document. It discusses, amongst other matters,
More issues than these are raised in the Finding and I urge all OHS people to read the document and reflect on the OHS management in their workplaces.
If all you knew about occupational health and safety (OHS) was what you read in the physical or online newspapers , you would not know anything about safety management – or maybe anything positive. It takes being involved with managing safety in the real world to understand how OHS operates in the real world. But even then we only learn from our own experiences.
The 92-page coronial finding into the death of Jorge Castello-Riffo, released last week, is a tragic and detailed case study of OHS in the real world and should be obligatory reading for OHS professionals and those trying to understand the push for increased OHS, penalties and corporate accountability. Below I look at just one section of the Coronial Findings in this article – the Coroner’s responses to a set of proposed recommendations.
The business sector of Australia has been remarkably quiet on the recent media attention given to hazard of silicosis in, particularly, the synthetic stone commonly used as kitchen benchtops. However the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) did make a media statement.
It largely emphasised its role as a member of Safe Work Australia and the action taken on silicosis matters through that mechanism. However membership of a tripartite consultative mechanism does not mean that that is the only pathway for change. SafetyAtWorkBlog put some questions to ACCI about silicosis and its Associate Director, Work Health & Safety and Workers’ Compensation Policy, Jennifer Low, responded:
SAWB: The media statement says that ACCI will continue to be active through its representation on Safe Work Australia. Are there any specific dust-related initiatives that ACCI is recommending to its members? Perhaps in relation to supply chain safety on high silica-content products? Continue reading “ACCI on silicosis”