Paying heed to Health and Safety

Occupational Health and Safety now more regularly referred to Workplace Health and Safety (WH&S). It’s the responsibility of both the Business Owner or Manager/Supervisor and the staff themselves to ensure that risks are eliminated and minimised, advice, information and training is given and shared and a host of other measures are in place for a safe workplace. That includes putting in place a continuous improvement program where the business constantly scans itself for potential risks and hazards.

The team at One Week At A Time raised WH&S and touched on a case where a business was experiencing litigation surrounding WH&S. Although we are by no means an expert in this field, there are important, in fact critical, lessons that need to be learnt. And it’s based around a safe mindset of:

Sooner rather than later.

Safer rather than sorry.

There are preventative interventions that employees can take to protect their staff. For example personal protective gear is given to staff and maintained by each staff member. Another example may be for every spill of liquid on a smooth floor, place a hazard sign next to it immediately while the cleaning gear is being fetched. There are many more examples like these that the business can identify and implement that are based on both common sense and experience. The key concern for Business Leaders however, in WH&S is to ensure that your business is doing enough in this area and continually check in regularly with your team at every appropriate opportunity to follow up on any questions or queries that are raised.

Go straight to the source

Each Australian state has a regulatory body with outlined rules for what each employee and employer are responsible for in the workplace to ensure safety. Following are a list of each body mandated to administer national Workplace Health and Safety legislation:

National Australian Body for WHS

Comcare - other national regulations

NSW - SafeWork

VIC - WorkSafe Victoria

QLD - Workcover Queensland

SA - Worksafe SA

WA - Commerce WA/Worksafe

NT - NT Worksafe

ACT - Worksafe ACT

TAS - Worksafe Tasmania

 

More References

(1) http://www.australia.gov.au/information-and-services/jobs-and-workplace/whs-workplace-health-and-safety

 

(2) http://www.worksafe.vic.gov.au/pages/safety-and-prevention/health-and-safety-topics/ohs-management-systems

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