Kevin Rudd – Page 2 – SafetyAtWorkBlog

Judicial inquiry into insulation dominated by election campaign politics

Australia’s conservative opposition leader, Tony Abbott, has announced that he intends to conduct a judicial inquiry into the government’s handling of the home insulation program (HIP) that resulted in the deaths of four workers in Queensland and New South Wales in 2009 and 2010.

Such a call would, normally, be very welcome but the timing of Abbott’s announcement brings a level of political baggage that weakens his commitment. Continue reading “Judicial inquiry into insulation dominated by election campaign politics”

How good intentions can lead to workplace deaths

The recent coronial finding into three workplace deaths related to an Australian government economic stimulus package in 2009 has muddled the safety profession over the political context and the OHS context of these deaths. But the finding and resulting discussions could be the catalyst for a much-needed analysis of how decisions made with good intentions in Canberra can lead to the tragic personal and shopfloor decisions in the suburbs.

Nanny State

The Home Insulation Program (HIP) could have been interpreted as government “interference” in the market and been badged as “nanny state” economics. However it may be possible to argue that Prime Minister Rudd could have been an economic hero if the Home Insulation Program had continued without any deaths. Continue reading “How good intentions can lead to workplace deaths”

Coronial report into insulation deaths slams government actions

This week a Queensland Coroner brought down the findings into the deaths of three men, Matthew Fuller (25), Rueben Barnes (16) and Mitchell Sweeney (22). Each of these men were electrocuted whilst installing foil insulation in the roofs of Queensland houses as part of a Federally funded economic stimulus project during 2009 and 2012.

Since the Coroner’s findings were published on 4 July 2013, the Australian media has focussed its attention, principally, on Kevin Rudd. Rudd was the Prime Minister and a major motivator at the time for the stimulus package, named the Home Insulation Program or HIP by the Coroner. Rudd recently regained the Prime Ministership providing a fresh political newsworthiness to the HIP issues. But in this attention, the Coroner’s broad findings are often being overlooked. Continue reading “Coronial report into insulation deaths slams government actions”

OHS Strategy to nowhere

Throughout 2011, Safe Work Australia (SWA) has been conducting consultative workshops in the development of the next ten-year National OHS Strategy. SafetyAtWorkBlog reported previously on the Melbourne meeting. SWA has released their report into that Melbourne meeting.

The meeting had a set of criteria for the stakeholders to consider. Sadly, there was no forewarning of the issues to be discussed so the workshop took some time to gain traction. With only one day of consultation, it would have been more productive to release the agenda topics a day or two earlier. These topics, each of which could have generated at least a half-day’s debate, are listed below

“Social/Economic/Emerging Issues in the Workforce, Business and Technology…

Hazards – Enhancing the capacity of workplaces to respond to:

Disease-Causing Hazards …

Injury-Causing Hazards …

Psychological Injury-Causing Hazards …

Work Health and Safety Systems – Challenges and Solutions in Safe Design and Work Systems, Skills and Training, and in Safety Leadership and Organisational Culture…..”

The report has responses to each of these topics but many of the suggestions are already known. The lack of creativity in the suggestions is largely disappointing. The responses to “what will success looks like in ten years” are mostly extensions of programs that are already in place or a perpetuation of the “way things are done now”. Innovation was largely missing, perhaps due to the participants not being able to lose their own agendas. The earlier SafetyAtWorkBlog article discussed the negative impact of the shadow of harmonisation, a term found only once in SWA’s report. Continue reading “OHS Strategy to nowhere”

Australian OHS experts call for a single OHS regulator and a unified insurance system

Some of Australia’s top work health and safety experts have stressed, to Safe Work Australia, the need for a single national OHS regulator. Many also called for a radical overhaul of workers’ compensation and insurance structures to achieve a combined insurance/compensation similar to that of New Zealand, the Accident Compensation Commission (ACC).

These calls were made in a whole day workshop, conducted by Safe Work Australia on 30 August 2011, on the development of the next ten-year national OHS strategy. This was the latest of around ten consultative sessions whose notes will be summarised and posted online. The notes from an earlier seminar list the following discussion topics:

“The need to focus on work health and safety prevention.
Engagement with target groups and industries to ensure advice and support is relevant to enable them to effectively respond to hazards.
Engineering hazards out through good design.
Influencing the supply chain inside and outside Australia.
Prioritising key work health and safety hazards and focusing national attention.
Creating opportunities for innovation in work health and safety particularly within the regulatory framework.
Enhancing the culture of safety leadership (promoting highly reliable organisations).
The importance of safety culture.
Enhancing the capability of workers to return to work following accident or illness.
Influencing or assisting academia to undertake research – focusing on intervention effectiveness.
Developing a shared communication strategy to promote the new principles of the new Strategy.”

These echo many of the comments in today’s seminar and illustrate what was a major missed opportunity. The theme of today’s workshop was to imagine what OHS (or work health and safety or work health safety & environment, as some suggested) will be like in 2022 but there were few futuristic suggestions. This was the opportunity to extend some of the practices currently undertaken by ten years. Continue reading “Australian OHS experts call for a single OHS regulator and a unified insurance system”

Now is the time for all good OHS lobbyists to come to the aid of their country

Now is the time for the OHS fraternity to lobby local politicians on the importance of workplace safety for the community and business.

Australia is facing a hung Parliament following the 21 August 2010 federal election. OHS was mentioned early in the campaign but not since even though there were opportunities. Industrial relations was raised in the election campaign by the Australian Labor Party but the Liberals chose not to play and its IR spokesperson, Eric Abetz, was missing in action. But OHS law reform has been less about improving the law than about reducing the cost on business (even though the significance of this is argument is highly dubious) and this is where discussion on OHS could have occurred.

The Liberal Party is continuing to assert that “stop the waste” is a positive message as it relates to government spending. It projects itself as the friend of business and the free-market and has reluctantly accepted the reality of OHS legislation although not the cost of effective compliance. The Liberals could have used the OHS harmonisation process as an example of an economic reform IT began* but has been supported and progressed through the Rudd/Gillard Labor government.

Now, in a political climate where the Australian Greens and some Independents will hold the balance of power in the Senate and have the chance to form a coalition government with either party, the IR policies of smaller party miners and independents will be crucial for OHS and workplace relations. Continue reading “Now is the time for all good OHS lobbyists to come to the aid of their country”

The politics of the insulation debacle become clearer

The debacle of the Australian Government’s insulation job creation scheme faded when the scheme was cancelled suddenly by the Government earlier in 2010. Attention was always going to return at various stages as investigations into the deaths of young insulation installers begin but Parliament resumed earlier and the Opposition attacked. The attack has led to the release of correspondence between the Minister responsible for the debacle, Peter Garrett, and the Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd. (A good example of the role of an effective Opposition in ensuring open government)

The news papers on 28 May 2010 have focused on the fact that the Prime Minister was aware of the serious occupational health and safety deficiencies of the system months before serious action was taken on the scheme. However, the correspondence also indicates that Garrett was not inactive on the safety risks in 2009 as many critics allege. Continue reading “The politics of the insulation debacle become clearer”

Category: Kevin Rudd

Judicial inquiry into insulation dominated by election campaign politics

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How good intentions can lead to workplace deaths

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Coronial report into insulation deaths slams government actions

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OHS Strategy to nowhere

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Australian OHS experts call for a single OHS regulator and a unified insurance system

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Now is the time for all good OHS lobbyists to come to the aid of their country

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The politics of the insulation debacle become clearer

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