Recently a safety professional told me he was investigating an incident on a work site and asked his first question “What do you think caused the incident?” The response was “safety culture”. Of course the next question will always be “what do you mean by safety culture?” and in most cases at this point the … Continue reading “Where are the Codes for establishing a safety culture?”
Occupational health and safety (OHS) regulatory agencies have existed for decades, originally with an enforcement role but increasingly aimed to prevention and education. It is fair to say the “2nd generation” of OHS regulators in Australia appeared in the 1980s. It is also fair to expect to be able to readily access the corporate memory and prosecutorial … Continue reading “How can one learn from OHS mistakes if those mistakes are hidden?”
Neil Foster of the University of Newcastle is known to SafetyAtWorkBlog for his work looking at the legal liabilities of company directors and officers. Recently Foster released a paper called “You can’t do that! Directors insuring against criminal WHS penalties” which provides an additional legal context to an earlier blog article. Foster acknowledges that “…provisions of the criminal law imposing personal … Continue reading “Insurance may diminish a director’s commitment to their positive OHS duty”
With the change of political heart from some of Australia’s state governments over the harmonisation of occupational health and safety laws, many academic and legal publishers revised their book plans as the national market was less national. However, some continued to publish understanding that although OHS harmonisation had a political deadline of 1 January 2012, … Continue reading “New book on OHS laws challenges current understandings of workplace safety”
Australian lawyer Michael Tooma is mentioned regularly in the SafetyAtWorkBlog, mostly because Tooma is one of the few who consider workplace safety in the broader social context. In The Australian newspaper on 10 February 2012 Tooma wrote that new work health and safety laws being introduced in Australia present “…a march … into the traditional heartland of the public … Continue reading “The social context of OHS laws is being poorly handled”
One of the best summaries of the current status of the new Australian Work Health and Safety laws was published in The Australian newspaper on 27 January 2012 (not available without a subscription). Lawyers from Norton Rose, Michael Tooma, Alena Titterton and Melissa Cornell, express doubts that harmonisation of national safety laws is possible. They write: “At … Continue reading “OHS harmonisation may be dead, so who will pick up the pieces?”
The 28 December 2011 edition of the Australian Financial Review (AFR) (not available online) quotes Australian labour lawyer, Michael Tooma, talking about the harmonisation of workplace safety laws: “It’s descended into a farce, a shambles – only four jurisdictions are ready for the laws.” This seems supported by the words of the recently-appointed Workplace Relations … Continue reading “Lawyer says OHS harmonisation has become a shambles”