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Category: construction
OHS is often about broken promises
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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Many safety lessons from one workplace death
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,
- A curious attitude from SafeWorkSA
- The role of Safe Work Method Statements and risk assessments
- Using the right plant for the right task
- Contractual relationships
- Construction methodology.
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.
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Scissor Lift death findings clarify the context of OHS
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.
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ACCI on silicosis
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”
By looking at the silicosis tree, we might miss the forest of dust
Rumours of a TV report on the increasing hazards of silicosis have floated around for a week or so. On October 10 2018, the show appeared on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s 7.30 program. But the story is much bigger than the ten minutes or so on that program.
The focus is understandably on silica but perhaps that is too specific. Maybe the issue of dust, in general, needs more attention.
However,
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CFMEU steps up the OHS pressure
SafetyAtWorkBlog has dipped into the occupational health and safety (OHS) and political issues around the death of Jorge Castillo-Riffo in Adelaide in 2014. On October 4 2018, the CFMEU issued a media release outlining the recommendations it made to the Coronial inquest into Castillo-Riffo’s death. They deserve serious consideration:
- Mandatory coronial inquests should be held into all deaths at work, with a mandatory requirement for the reporting of any action taken, or proposed to be taken, in consequence of any findings and recommendations made;
- Families should receive funding to be represented;
- An independent safety commissioner should be established in SA whose duty it is to review, comment and provide recommendations concerning the safety record of companies who tender for government construction contracts work over $5 million;
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