myths – Page 2 – SafetyAtWorkBlog

Everything you think you know about safety boots may be wrong

SafetyAtWorkBlog reader Tony wrote a long comment on safety footwear in response to a blog article from 2016. The comment deserves its own post, below.

Hi Kevin – arriving at this conversation incredibly late (though ‘better late than never’, as I believe someone once intoned), but there’s a decent reason I’m now invested in the conversation.

I recently spent an interesting hour or so with a sports podiatrist discussing, as you would suspect, footwear. More specifically, we talked about footwear to suite workers who spend the bulk of their time outdoors, working and walking on innumerable forms of uneven surfaces. And more specifically again, we discussed the degree(s) of ankle protection that, evidently, high-cut boots are able to provide.

But…

One of the take-home messages I took was the (apparent) absence of data to support the continued promotion of ‘high-cut’ footwear, when it comes to trying to provide ankle protection.

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Rotting fish and leadership

Occupational health and safety (OHS) has been obsessed by Leadership for a long time. Leadership is important to establish safe and health workplaces but there is certainly a lot more to change than waiting for the boss to see the light. In many of these discussions, someone will use this phrase to emphasize the importance of leadership:

A fish rots first from the head

This is a biologically suspicious statement that SafetyAtWorkBlog has been eying to verify or dismiss for several years, unsuccessfully. A new fact checking website site drawing on the scientific community has been established and SafetyAtWorkBlog recently posed this question to www.metafact.io:

“Does a fish rot from the head?”

Let’s see what the experts say but in the meantime, please post your thoughts and comments on the question below.

Kevin Jones

Trade unions temper language on ABCC safety role

The politics of industrial relations will be a crucial element of Australia’s Federal election due later this year. The Federal Government has already used workplace safety as a reason for the reintroduction of the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC). The trade union movement’s latest response is a campaign launched on April 10, 2016 accompanied by an online video. Continue reading “Trade unions temper language on ABCC safety role”

OHS is not broken but does need attention

Recently an article was posted on SHPOnline called “Health and safety needs a re-brand“. The article by Anna Keen ties in with the Safety Differently or Safety 1-Safety 2 movements but needs to be considered carefully.

The street interviews were conducted in England where occupational health and safety (OHS) has undergone such a slagging off by the tabloid media that the Health and Safety Executive had to devote resources to countering the misrepresentation of OHS. This misrepresentation has been occurring since the mid-2000s. The video in the article is conformation of the success of the tabloid media outrage that even led to a pathetic attempt at comedy at OHS’s expense.

OHS, particularly in the United Kingdom but less so in Australia, has a perception problem which is clear from the video but will re-branding be enough?

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Drug and alcohol testing does not improve workplace safety, so why have it?

Testing for drug and alcohol effects in workplaces sounds sensible but what do you do when there is no evidence that it improves worker safety or reduces risk? Apparently ignore the evidence, create industrial tension and impose unnecessary costs on industry.

The Australian national government and the Victorian (State) government have both pledged to introduce drug and alcohol testing for the construction sector. The Victorian Government also promised to introduce drug and alcohol testing for parliamentarians but everyone expects a backdown on that election pledge.

Recently two researchers in Adelaide, Ken Pidd and Anne Roche published a research paper in Accident Analysis & Prevention asking “how effective is drug testing as a workplace safety strategy?“. The abstract states:

“…the evidence base for the effectiveness of testing in improving workplace safety is at best tenuous.”

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Inexactitudes could lead to OHS myths

Consulting firm Deloittes recently announced the merging of its occupational health and safety (OHS) and sustainability sectors in order to provide better customer services. In the article Deloittes says about the importance of workplace mental health:

“Given that one in six working age Australians live with mental illness including depression, that is costing Australian businesses at least $11 billion dollars each year, this is a growing area^“.

But the source of this statement is unclear and this lack of clarity may be contributing to some of the inexactitudes in the mental health/wellbeing debate. Continue reading “Inexactitudes could lead to OHS myths”

A rough ride on OHS

Since I heard about the Gaia hypothesis in the 1980s, I have read most of James Lovelock‘s books. I was confronted by his argument that nuclear power is undervalued as one of the cleanest and sustainable sources of power, as I have grown up listening to anti-nuclear activists like Helen Caldicott and being frightened by films like Fail Safe and Threads. I am not sure I agree with Lovelock but I respect him. In his latest book, though, he makes a couple of negative references to occupational health and safety (OHS) that are cheap shots, unfair or disappointing.

Lovelock says, on page 2 of “A Rough Ride to the Future” that the chemical industry is “now mainly run by an intelligent and usually responsible technocracy” but that

“…we may be hampered in our attempts to solve the large problems [of pollution] by the absurdly zealous application of health and safety laws.” (emphasis added)

In discussing oxygen levels in the atmosphere and how its regulation is so important, Lovelock says, in parentheses,

“We are fortunate there is no inbuilt health and safety system in Gaia, otherwise the dangers of fires would have led to the banning of its production.” (page 13)

This comment, moreso than the former, shows Lovelock misunderstands OHS regulation and application. Earlier in the book he praises the banning of chlorofluorocarbons on climatic reasons and then, absurdly, implies that OHS would advocate the banning of oxygen. It’s a cheap shot. OHS is about trying to eliminate the risk of harm and by investigating the source of the hazard, usually through the scientific method.

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Category: myths

Everything you think you know about safety boots may be wrong

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Rotting fish and leadership

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OHS is not broken but does need attention

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Drug and alcohol testing does not improve workplace safety, so why have it?

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Inexactitudes could lead to OHS myths

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A rough ride on OHS

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