One of the central tenets of modern safety management is the need to establish a safety culture. However recent Australian research has cast serious doubt on whether this current belief is valid or useful. In October 2014, the Safety Institute of Australia launched several new chapters to the Body of Knowledge (BoK) project. One of …
On 27 October 2014 the Safety Institute of Australia, with the support of RMIT University conducted a seminar on safety in the construction industry. As with the event last year the issue of Safe Work Method Statements (SWMS) dominated the conversation. The same frustrations were expressed as last year – SWMS are too big and …
For a little while employers, government and trade unions in Australia were spreading their consultative pool on occupational health and safety (OHS) matters. Recently that triumvirate seems to have returned to a more exclusive structure. The reason is unclear but the situation is a backward step and one that fails to take advantage of the … Continue reading “OHS consultation through social media – the new (and better) way”
The harmonisation of Australia’s occupational health and safety (OHS) laws has stagnated since the West Australian government’s tepid response to the strategy and Victoria’s belligerent and ill-founded rejection. But some continue to examine the harmonisation process. Eric Windholz is one of those researchers. Windholz is a former executive of Victoria’s WorkSafe and is now with … Continue reading “Australian research on OHS harmonisation’s progress, success and errors”
The May 2013 National Safety magazine has an article on safety leadership by Australia lawyer, Michael Tooma. It is a terrific article but it also highlights the lack of case studies of the practical reality of safety leadership in Australia and the great distance still required to improve safety. Tooma starts the article with “It … Continue reading “Is safety leadership the panacea for unsafe workplaces?”
For several years Australia has been designing and constructing a National Workers Memorial. This weekend, on the World Day for Safety and Health at Work, Australia holds its first national remembrance day at the new memorial on the banks Lake Burley Griffin in Australia’s capital city, Canberra. The memorial has been coordinated by the National Capital Authority who … Continue reading “Australia set to open its National Workers Memorial”
A lot of recent discussion of the impacts of workplace safety and productivity has centred on the Productivity Commission’s “Performance Benchmarking of Australian Business Regulation: Occupational Health & Safety” Report of 2010. However there was a 1995 report by the then-Industry Commission that can provide some broader context to the safety/productivity discussion. Recent evidence and … Continue reading “Evidence exists of productivity benefits of OHS but no one is using it”