SafeWork – Page 30 – SafetyAtWorkBlog

Politics on display in final report of Australia’s Industrial Deaths inquiry

The Australian Senate inquiry into Industrial Deaths has released its findings in a report called “They never came home—the framework surrounding the prevention, investigation and prosecution of industrial deaths in Australia“. For those who have followed the inquiry, there are few surprises but the report presents big political challenges, particularly as a Federal Election must occur no later than May 2019.

It has been increasingly common for such Senate reports to include, not necessarily, a Minority Report, but an alternative perspective on some issues. Sometimes these reports show dissent in the Committee but more often than not these are statements that are aimed

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Glyphosate presents an OHS problem but maybe OHS is the path to a solution

Occupational health and safety (OHS) related decisions are made on the state of knowledge about hazards and it is up to OHS people to make sure the state of knowledge is at its best so that the best decisions can be made. But what do you do if the state of knowledge on a hazard seems to be made purposely uncertain and that uncertainty is leading to the status quo, which also happens to provide a huge income for the owner of the product creating the hazard.

This seems to be a situation at the moment in Australia in relation to the use of the weedkiller, glyphosate, marketed heavily by the global chemical company, Monsanto. The alleged corruption of data on which OHS people and workers base their safety decisions was perhaps one of the most disturbing elements of the recent ABC Four Corners program on the chemical (

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CFMEU steps up the OHS pressure

SafetyAtWorkBlog has dipped into the occupational health and safety (OHS) and political issues around the death of Jorge Castillo-Riffo in Adelaide in 2014. On October 4 2018, the CFMEU issued a media release outlining the recommendations it made to the Coronial inquest into Castillo-Riffo’s death. They deserve serious consideration:

Mandatory coronial inquests should be held into all deaths at work, with a mandatory requirement for the reporting of any action taken, or proposed to be taken, in consequence of any findings and recommendations made;

Families should receive funding to be represented;

An independent safety commissioner should be established in SA whose duty it is to review, comment and provide recommendations concerning the safety record of companies who tender for government construction contracts work over $5 million;

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New OHS toolkit for small business

October is the peak month for promoting occupational health and safety (OHS) in Australia. “OSHtober” as some on social media are saying. SafeWorkNSW has released a handbook designed to help small businesses, in particular, to assess their own workplace hazards.

The “toolkit” employs the traffic light format to prioritise hazards. That format

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Structural v Individual approaches to preventing psychological harm persist

At the end of September 2018 the Australian Psychological Society held its 2018 Congress. As conferences do, various media statements are released to generate interest in the speakers. One caught the attention of this blog. It was released on September 25 2018, and was called:

“Resilience isn’t enough to combat the effects of burnout, world renowned psychology expert says”

This sounded like it may look closely at the prevention of harm and SafetyAtWorkBlog was able to interview that world-renowned psychology expert,

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Comcare Conference raises good questions

The 2018 Comcare conference currently happening in Melbourne Australia is a mixed bag, perhaps as conferences should be. There is a mix of useful information and perspectives but this has also led to mixed messages.

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The sexual harassment you walk past is the sexual harassment you accept

Australian Human Rights Commissioner, Kate Jenkins, has released the findings of the Commission’s latest survey on sexual harassment in workplaces. It is an important analysis of an improving dataset that should make actions to prevent sexual harassment more effective.

The statistical report is separate from the Commission’s National Inquiry into Sexual Harassment in Australian Workplaces and does not emphasise the role of harm prevention but it does contain references to prevention that are worth considering.

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