The Human Resources and Human Rights sectors in Australia are increasingly realising how useful the occupational health and safety (OHS) structures, laws and processes can be to preventing harm related to bullying, sexual harassment and gender-based violence. Recently, a joint presentation by Dr Rachel Cox from Canada and Associate Professor Belinda Smith from Australia (pictured above) highlighted this cross-sectoral awakening.
The 2026 conference for the International Association on Workplace Bullying and Harassment (IAWBH) was held in Canberra in June 2026. I was always curious about how prominent the term “psychosocial hazards” would be at this conference. It seems that most of the world still talks about workplace bullying and harassment and sexual harassment separately from the psychosocial, but the occupational health and safety (OHS) approach seems to be in the ascendant.
Below is my take (part 1 of 2) on the conference sessions I attended and the issues raised. (I missed the half day of Day 3). I have tried to use a generic, informative tone for a broader readership.
I am not sure that the “Why” was discussed enough at this global conference. The discussions in the sessions I sat in were dominated by people trying to clarify what bullying and harassment are and what variations nor subcultures there are, or what sections of the community are most affected by workplace bullying and harassment. And I am not sure that all the presenters were targeting the workplace, even though the association and conference titles specify this.
Safe Work Australia’s (SWA) latest consultation on quad bike safety is another reminder that fatalities and serious injuries continue despite years of guidance, rebates, training campaigns and polite encouragement. The evidence laid out in SWA’s consultation paper shows that harm has persisted even after “extensive education and awareness efforts”, so voluntary approaches have reached their limit. When a hazard keeps killing people in the same predictable ways, the question is no longer whether we need stronger regulation but why it has taken so long to get there. This moment demands more than another round of messaging — it demands decisions that actually change the machines people ride and the conditions they ride them in.
Below is my submission to SWA’s consultation process on improving the safety of quad bikes used in the workplace. I strongly encourage everyone to participate.
Business management advisers keep calling everyone a “leader”, but the term has become so vague it obscures who actually holds the power — and therefore the accountability — to prevent work-related harm. Psychosocial hazards aren’t fixed by slogans or culture talk; they’re shaped by decisions about workload, staffing, supervision and resources.
This article is based on my presentation to the Central Safety Group members on May 12, 2026, about leadership and occupational health and safety (OHS).
In the mid‑1970s, I arrived at Dandenong High School still clinging to the small importance I’d felt as a primary‑school Prefect. That confidence evaporated the day a student yelled “bums to the wall” as Science Teacher and Year 7 Coordinator Tim Richardson walked past. I didn’t yet know what a paedophile was, but Richardson would not be prosecuted for sexual offences until 2018, dying in jail a year later.
This experience reflects a broader cultural pattern of denial that still shapes how organisations respond to psychosocial hazards today. Australian companies, executives and employers are grappling with “new” duties to prevent psychological harm, yet Richardson’s story shows just how long our institutions have excused what should never have been excused.
Agricultural safety has come to the fore in Australia and New Zealand over the last few weeks. Safe Work Australia (SWA) has commenced a public consultation on the safety of using a quad bike for work. It is quite revealing and limited.
