An article in the InDaily online newspaper for 4 April 2011 provides several safety management issues that are worth pondering. (Thanks to the readers who brought the article to my attention) Keith Brown was the CEO of South Australia’s Workcover Corporation earlier this century. He has told InDaily that he lost his position due to … Continue reading “Success from enlightenment not compliance”
Over the last few months most Australian OHS regulators, and many labour law firms,have been conducting workshops and public seminars on Australia’s plans to harmonise its OHS legislation. In those workshops, the consultative process and timeframes have been described by some as a “nightmare”, which is not exactly inspiring participants who are seeking clarity from … Continue reading “Safe Work Method Statements and independent positions”
Labour law firms in many cities conduct free seminars on the legal issues of the day. These may involve union right-of-entry, OHS changes, privacy or right-to-know. The seminars are intended to generate custom by showing how informed and professional the legal firm is. Commercially for the firm, the seminars are a good idea. For safety … Continue reading “Consultation and issue resolution should be top OHS priorities”
Every year, around this time, law firms and OHS regulators release statements and good OHS advice about the risks of Christmas and end-of-year work parties. But companies who wait until now to introduce control measures and policies for the risks of occupational violence, sexual harassment and reputational damage have, largely, missed the opportunity to effectively … Continue reading “Controlling Christmas party risks is a year-round activity”
The current Executive Director of WorkSafe, Cath Bowtell, has confirmed that she will contest a seat in the Australian Parliament, according to The Age and AAP reports on 6 July 2010. As previously stated, this move sets some challenges for WorkSafe Victoria. The Acting Executive Director following John Merritt’s departure, Stan Krpan, put in his … Continue reading “Cath Bowtell jumps to federal politics”
The question in the title of this article came about from the release of a fabulous new book by LexisNexis- Butterworths – Australian Labour Law – Text, Cases & Commentary, 5th edition. Through my introductory look at the book, it seems that occupational health and safety gets around half a page in a book of over 1200 … Continue reading “Is OHS part of Labour Law?”
Last month Joe Catanzariti of the Australian law firm, Clayton Utz, wrote a short article that links two OHS issues in a manner that others should follow. Catanzariti made the jump from a prosecution under current New South Wales OHS legislation (according to many the most draconian in Australia) to identify how such a decision would be made under the harmonise OHS … Continue reading “Case study of existing hazards in the new legislative context”