The Hazelwood mine fire has faded from the memory of most Victorians following the Parliamentary inquiry but not so for those who continue to live in the Latrobe Valley and with the health consequences of the fire. Tom Doig has written a short book on the incident and its consequences that will put pressure on … Continue reading “OHS and public health at The Coal Face”
2014 is going to present tough challenges to Australia’s politicians and corporate leaders. The Royal Commission into the Home Insulation Program, in particular, is going to illustrate and perhaps generate ideological conflict. The Home Insulation Program (HIP) was established quickly to address a looming economic crisis. Politicians and business leaders wanted Australia to avoid the global recession … Continue reading “Moral conflicts in store for Australian politicians and bureaucrats”
There is one word that should not be used as an adjective in relation to workplace fatalities – impacted. Workers fall from roofs and the concrete floor has an impact on them. Workers hit by mobile plant or crushed in machines die from the impact. An impact results from the transfer of energy and this … Continue reading “A shaky start leads to a terrific book on incident investigation by Michael Tooma”
At the recent Safe Work Australia Awards, the Minister for Workplace Relations had a dig at “safety culture“, according to an article from the National Safety Council of Australia. Bill Shorten said : “It is not the systems or the fancy talk about culture that will save people’s lives.” This has been interpreted by … Continue reading “Safety leadership and culture require accountability”
Dr Yossi Berger of the Australian Workers Union has been reading some of the debate in SafetyAtWorkBlog and offered the article below for publication. He said to SafetyAtWorkBlog “…in relation to BP’s OHS catastrophes and comments about their management style, their managers and this aspirational, easily-bandied-about notion of workplace culture. Two things stimulated me to … Continue reading “The Astonished Manager: Not in my wildest dreams”
Two days ago, Ian Macdonald, the New South Wales Minister for Mineral Resources opened the annual conference of the NSW Minerals Council. It was a dour presentation but delegates said that the Minister is not the most exciting public speaker. Macdonald announced a new research program into safety culture, an announcement that did not get much response from the conference delegates, … Continue reading “Mining Minister’s safety claims challenged”
Recently, SafetyAtWorkBlog received a long anonymous email concerning the death of David Colson, Tasmanian abalone diver who drowned in October 2007. The Coroner completed his inquest into the death and released his investigation findings in early January 2010. An earlier blog article on the findings can be found here The correspondent pointed out that Allen … Continue reading “Something fishy in Tasmania’s abalone industry”