Twelve months after the NSCA Foundation resurrected its occupational health and safety (OHS) conference program, SafetyCONNECT has settled into to a comfortable niche. This year’s conference, in an established Brisbane location has attracted around 140 delegates and almost 20 exhibitors. Perhaps most importantly is they have been able to attract entertaining and challenging local and international speakers. Continue reading “Power in simplicity – SafetyCONNECT”
If you don’t prevent, you perpetuate
One of the most important occupational health and safety (OHS) guidances released the last couple of years is the Safe Work Australia (SWA) guide “Work-related psychological health and safety: A systematic approach to meeting your duties“, but its significance is not being universally embraced.
Recently Australian law firm, Minter Ellison, released an
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The banks are having their culture changed for them and OHS needs to watch and learn
Occupational health and safety (OHS) is easy. Change is hard. OHS can identify workplace hazards and risks but it is the employer or business owner or Person Conducting Business or Undertaking (PCBU) who needs to make the decision to change. All of this activity occurs within, and due to, the culture of each workplace and work location. OHS lives within, and affects, each company’s organisational culture but a safety subculture is almost invisible, so it is worth looking at the broader organisational culture and there is no better show, at the moment in Australia, than The Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry (the Banking Royal Commission).
Public submissions are littered with references to culture but it is worth looking more closely at what one of the corporate financial regulators said in a submission in April 2018. The Australian Securities and Investment Commission (ASIC) wrote:
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People Risk = OHS for Human Resource professionals
The Governance Institute of Australia hosted a discussion about “Corporate culture and people risk — lessons from the Royal Commission”. The seminar was worthwhile attending but there was also moments of discomfort.
The reality was that The Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry was not discussed in any great detail as it was treated as a ghost hovering behind the discussion but not a scary ghost, almost a ghost of embarrassment.
And it seems that “People Risk” is what the Human Resource (HR) profession calls occupational health and safety (OHS) when it can’t bring itself to say occupational health and safety.
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Solar panel pledge incorporates workplace safety
Victoria’s Premier Daniel Andrews announced a State-supported program to install solar panels on an estimation of 65,00 homes if his Labor Party is re-elected this November. This election campaign announcement immediately reminds voters of the last government-sponsored “green” program, the Home Insulation Scheme which, amongst other results, lead to the deaths five workers.
Unsurprisingly,
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Boland releases Public Consultancy Summary of WHS inquiry
The Independent Review of Model WHS Laws being conducted by Marie Boland released a Public Consultation Summary on August 17 2018. Boland lists the concerns raised with her as including:
“the blurring of lines between WHS [work health and safety], public safety and public health”
“The length and complexity of the Regulations and Codes”
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Workplace Health Management programs save one hospital around $200k
It is always good to see researchers assessing issues related to workplace health and safety rather than relying on overseas data. Recently researchers from the Australian Catholic University and St Vincent’s Hospital in Melbourne looked into “measuring the effectiveness of workplace health management programs” . The research adds to our understanding of these programs but the relevance to occupational health and safety (OHS) is limited.
The researchers,
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