The Australian Human Resources Institute (AHRI) has recently published an article about the significant Human Resources trends for 2019. The trends identified include
SafetyAtWorkBlog will be more specific in its occupational health and safety (OHS) “trends” for 2019.
Several people were surprised when Industrial Manslaughter laws popped up on the agenda on Day 3 of the National Conference of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) this week. To ALP members from Western Australia and the Construction Forestry Mining Maritime and Energy Union, Christy Cain and Thomas French put a resolution on the issue to the Conference, which the delegates endorsed.
Most of the media who mentioned this resolution, and it was not many, focused on Cain’s urging of the delegates to
“Kill a worker, go to jail”.
Even though getting the audience to chant was colourful, and the minute’s silence important, the discussion around Industrial Manslaughter laws was more nuanced.
ON 22 November 2018, two days before the State Election, the Secretary of the Department of Treasury and Finance released a document called the “Release of costing of election commitment“. Most of the media attention was on the removal of a self-imposed “debt cap” by Treasurer, Tim Pallas, but there is an interesting footnote that seems to involve using some of WorkSafe Victoria’s premium income as a dividend to fund infrastructure.
Attachment A – “Summary of Labor’s 2018 Election Commitments” – lists the following table (figures are in millions):
Footnote 3 says:
Further to this morning’s article, the Victorian Greens provided the following information:
“The Greens believe that:
- Every employee deserves to be safe in the workplace
- Going to work should not involve putting lives at risk
- Harsh penalties should be in place to deter employers from cutting corners on workplace safety
- The law must provide justice for victims and families should preventable accidents occur in the workplace
Earlier this year, Nina Springle MP called on the Victorian Government to introduce corporate and industrial manslaughter laws. You can read more about it in the link below:
https://greens.org.au/vic/news/media-release/keeping-victorians-safe-work
In other states around Australia, the Greens have continually been strong advocates for industrial manslaughter laws.”
The policy platform of the Victorian Greens party has been publicly available for some time but there is only one paragraph in the 22 page document that directly addresses occupational health and safety (OHS):
“We voted for regulating labour hire, we will support criminalising wage theft, and we have called for industrial manslaughter laws.” (page 26)
But if a generous definition of workplace health and safety is applied there are several other policies of interest.
Every industry sector should have its own occupational health and safety (OHS) conference. This allows for specific OHS topics to be presented but also provides for a broader context. The recent conference conducted by the Victorian Branch of the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Federation (ANMF) was a great example.
So close to a State election and in the lead-up to a Federal election it was not surprising that the trade union movement’s Change The Rules campaign gained attention, as did the push for the introduction of Industrial Manslaughter laws, in the presentation by Dr Paul Sutton.
The main points of his presentation are familiar and have been reported on previously but this presentation included news about two exemptions to the laws which may raise uncomfortable questions.