The Victorian government has commenced its Royal Commission into the Integrity of Major Public and Civil Infrastructure Construction Projects in Victoria. Occupational health and safety (OHS) was mentioned on Day 1 in the opening statements of Counsel Assisting the Commissioner, Chris Young KC, indicating that OHS may feature in the investigations over the next year.
Australian work health and safety (WHS) law rests on the deceptively simple proposition that those who create or control risks must eliminate them, or reduce them so far as is reasonably practicable. It is a neat legal phrase that also hides much of the workplace reality.
Anyone who has spent time in workplaces knows how difficult it is. Most occupational health and safety (OHS) decisions are not reviewed by an inspector, challenged by a worker, or tested in court. They are made inside businesses, under commercial pressure, by people who may genuinely want to do the right thing but are also trying to meet production, budget and staffing demands. Too often, the employer’s view of what is “reasonable” becomes the working standard until something goes badly wrong.
Australia is living through a demographic and economic shift that is far more consequential for workplace safety than most organisations or regulators have acknowledged. George Megalogenis’ new book, Three Shocks, identifies three structural changes reshaping the nation: Australia is now a majority‑migrant country; professional women have overtaken blue‑collar men as the largest occupational group; and the geopolitical environment that once provided stability has become unpredictable. These shocks are lived realities in workplaces, and they demand an occupational health and safety (OHS) overhaul.
Australian employers keep saying they’re improving how they manage mental health at work, yet the basic problem remains: HR and OHS still operate in silos. You can see it in every psychological injury case where HR handles the person, and OHS handles the paperwork, but no one fixes the work. A recent episode of The Caring CEO featuring a conversation between Graeme Cowan and Kat Page showed how close we are to integrating people management and work design — and how far we still have to go.
I have been writing about how occupational health and safety should apply to professional contact sports for a few years. The emergence of concussion, traumatic brain injury, and CTE has changed how sports are managed and the sports themselves.
I hope when you have 14 minutes to spare, perhaps on your smoko, walking at lunchtime or on the gym’s treadmill, that you get a chance to listen. Afterwards, please post some comments or message me on the socials.
Australian trade unions rarely campaign solely on the basis of occupational health and safety (OHS), meaning without supplementary aims such as increased wages or remuneration. Below are some examples, but they are few and usually in the wake of an industrial disaster. There are a couple of prominent union OHS campaigners, but we rarely hear of them after their passing, and many of their contributions are remembered more through internal mythologising than through documented reform.
There seems to be an increase in democratic socialism in the United States. Socialism-based principles, the “common good,” the Green New Deal, limitarianism, post-neoliberalism, and others are being discussed with increasing seriousness. Underpinning these ideas is respect for humans (and others), a push to understand the limits and potential of humans, and a countering of the idea that humans are primarily “units of labour” and that their only value is determined by their productivity. Perhaps it is time to engage directly with, and politely challenge, these entrenched business approaches.
