What of International Workers Memorial Day in 2020?

ILO’s World Day on Safety and Health at Work occurs each year on April 28. Events are centred around monuments and places in capital cities and towns, speeches about the importance of occupational health and safety (OHS) are made and symbolic gestures are given.

The World Day is intended to be an acknowledgement of the importance of OHS for all workers and people of all political stances. The aim is to focus on workplace deaths, and the practical actions to prevent those deaths, not the politics of those deaths, but far more prominence is given to the trade union movement’s International Workers Memorial Day held on the same day.

So how will these memorial days work in this year of COVID19?

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The gig tightrope over a receding tide

The Australia Institute conducted a webinar on Australia’s economic future during and after the COVID19 pandemic. Former Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan and economist Richard Denniss were the featured speakers. Two particular issues were of relevance to occupational health and safety (OHS) – the future of the gig economy and re-industrialisation.

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Possible replacements for Safe Work Method Statements

Could improving the situational awareness of workers replace Safe Work Method Statements?

Many Australian occupational health and safety (OHS) professionals rally against the dominance of Safe Work Method Statements (SWMS). The application of SWMS beyond the legislated high-risk construction work parameters increases the amount of safety clutter and misrepresents OHS as being able to be satisfied by a, predominantly, tick-and-flick exercise. But critics of SWMS are rarely pushed on what, if anything, should replace SWMS? SafetyAtWorkBlog asked some experts and looked closer at the issue.

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OHS and Ian Good

Ian Good is a Principal Consultant with Hazcon and has accepted the offer to humanise occupational health and safety (OHS). Links have been added for those intrigued by Ian’s responses.

How did you get into Health & Safety?

My wife worked with the owner’s wife and after being made redundant from a Start-Up I was asked to come on board in an operations role.

What drives you?

The positive response you get from people who you provide consulting advice to; can be major companies or the smallest business.

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Inspection data offers COVID19 risk priorities

The coronavirus pandemic is an unexpected challenge for many employers and for workers. As this article from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation shows, there is confusion about the rights and duties of both parties at work.

Larry acted under his duty to not put himself at harm by raising his concern to his employer. The employer should have already determined that the workplace is safe and without risks to health and implemented control measures to reduce the risk of cross-infection. Guidance on how to do this has existed for several weeks.

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OHS and Craig Schopp

Craig Schopp is an occupational health and safety (OHS) consultant from South Australia, who runs his own business, Choose Safety, and has accepted the humanising OHS challenge.

How did you get into Health & Safety?

Initially picked safety up as an extension of process engineering and quality management, then found safety to be a better fit with my personal ethics. Looking back now, I realise that a lot of the process improvements we were implementing had a safety improvement too, but this was not really the main intention of the work.

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