Some time ago WorkSafe Victoria issued Compliance Codes on a number of workplace safety issues. One was concerning First Aid. The Compliance Codes were intended to replace Codes of Practice which had been around for decades. The previous major change to workplace first aid was in 1995 when the First Aid Code of Practice was … Continue reading “Flawed first aid information”
Working alone is an established workplace hazard in many industries. The control measure most applied is “don’t work alone” that is, undertake as many work tasks in isolated location with someone supervising or in close contact. Modern technology has often been applied as a possible control measure – “deadman switch”, GPS tracking, mobile phone use. … Continue reading “Working alone – a poorly understood work hazard”
The South Australian government has launched a website focusing on young people at work, not surprisingly called Youth@Work. South Australia has a habit of marching to a slightly different beat to the dominant Australian States on OHS. They did not follow WorkSafe Victoria’s “Homecomings” ads and they have been well ahead of anyone in … Continue reading “New Youth@Work website”
WorkSafe Victoria is very involved with moves to improve the professionalism of OHS practitioners in Australia. There is no doubt that improvements are required but the role of a state-based regulator in a non-regulatory system is curious. Surely such changes should be run from a national perspective Safety professionals often look at the prominence, influence … Continue reading “A vision for the OHS profession”
I’m a big fan of minimising the rehashing of OH&S guides. In my WorkSafe Victoria days (the latter ones when I was doing guidance material editing) I did what I could to encourage adoption of other people’s good work. And just today I found an example of a British Health & Safety Executive (HSE) guide … Continue reading “What a good safety management system looks like”
The tricky thing about getting safety right is making sure you are on top of where the dangers are. One danger that seems to be consistently “off the safety radar” for lots of workplaces, particularly small businesses, is falls. Here’s some key stuff you need to be looking at: Rule #1 for all safety problems … Continue reading “Falling under the safety radar”
SafetyAtWorkBlog has no expertise in the control of infectious diseases. Any enquiries received on the issue are directed to the official information on government websites such as Australia’s Dept for Health & Ageing or the US Centre for Disease Control, or international authorities such as WHO. But this creates a dilemma for OHS regulators. If the … Continue reading “Influenza – dilemma for OHS regulators”