November updates
Axento Safety provides you with health and safety expert witness and risk management solutions to enhance your business success.
In addition to incident investigations and expert witness services, Axento Safety’s focus is to help create safe, healthy, innovative AND PRODUCTIVE workplaces. Axento Safety partner with you to take the pain out of health and safety, provide safety management systems, reduce the paperwork, achieve certifications, enable increased compliance, enable productivity improvement and achieve this cost effectively.
Contact Jon Temby to improve risk management, grow your business and make your life easier
Injury risks increase before Christmas and over the New Year
Injury claims tend to rise in the lead up to Christmas, according to WorkCover Queensland, which there are some key things organisations can do to make sure workers stay safe this festive season and prevent unwanted injuries, Read More…
Jons comments: In our rush to finish off the mountains of jobs before Christmas and preparing for 2018, we are at increased risk of distractions, multitasking, cutting corners etc and being injured. The other risk is that should this occur, you are at an even greater risk of not meeting your deadlines because if a significant incident occurs, you are required to preserve the incident site and WorkSafe may keep it shut for several days or longer. The best prevention is to maintain your pace and safe systems of work, despite the increased pressures, ensure Labour Hire and other casual staff are fully inducted and supervised and any shutdown maintenance tasks are completed with adequate time and skilled staff. The other risk occurs at your Christmas breakup party: Your workers must know what sort of behaviour is acceptable and the repercussions for misconduct. Providing taxis for staff to get home following your Christmas function could be a good investment.
Safety Alert – Removal of unsafe emergency escape breathing devices
SafeWork NSW has issued a safety alert advising workplaces and the transport industry that the HFZY30 EEBD self-rescue respirator does not meet Australian Standards. They should be removed immediately from all workplaces, including from road transport vehicles. Read more…
Jons Comment: Not only should these breathing devices be removed but it is important that management and employees/workers are familiar with their emergency equipment, know where it is, how to use it and know that it will function as intended.
Workers’ Compensation Statistics 2015-16 report
Safe Work Australia’s Australian Workers’ Compensation Statistics 2015-16 reports provides detailed statistics on workers’ compensations claims lodged in Australia.
Key findings from the 2015-16 report, include:
- The three occupations with the highest rate of serious claims were Labourers, Machinery operators and drivers and Community and personal service workers.
- The three industries with the highest rate of serious claims were Agriculture, forestry and fishing, Manufacturing and Construction.
- Body stressing caused 39 per cent of serious claims, while falls, trips and slips led to 23 per cent of serious claims.
- The bodily location most commonly affected by injuries and diseases that led to serious claims was the back (20 per cent).
Discussing the key statistics from this report can contribute to making your workplace safer and healthier. See the Australian Workers’ Compensation Statistics 2015-16 report on the Safe Work Australia website.
WA OSH laws – further changes / bigger fines
Western Australia is seeking to introduce its ‘OSH Amendment Bill’ which will increase all health and safety fines including the most significant fine increasing from $625,000 to $3,500,000. Read more…
Jons Comment: The important message from these changes is the same for all Australian states and territories: ensure that you understand all your key risks, provide the resources necessary to control those risks, implement those controls to keep the key risks within acceptable levels, monitor those controls for ongoing effectiveness, ensure that the organisation can respond properly to emergency situations and have a feedback loop to senior management and Officers that these systems are working effectively. If you would like to discuss any part of this national expectation and obligation, please contact me.
QLD: Industrial Manslaughter laws passed
New industrial manslaughter laws have been passed by Queensland’s Parliament, and under the laws individuals guilty of industrial manslaughter will face 20 years imprisonment, with corporate offenders liable for fines of up to $10 million Of note are the new Industrial Manslaughter provisions which make it easier to prosecute Directors and executive management should a fatality occur. The changes also prevent the use of Enforceable Undertakings being accepted where the incident involves a fatality. Read more…. .
Jons Comments: The new Industrial Manslaughter laws relate to the situation where an employer’s negligence causes someone’s death. Hopefully there will be two clear outcomes from this legislation: 1. Improved employer OHS awareness and incident prevention activity and 2. Because of the greater focus and actions to improve OHS implementation, no one will be killed at work and fewer serious incidents will occur.
Safety warning: silica dust cancer risk
With new estimates showing that over 230 totally preventable lung cancer cases in Australia each year are caused by exposure to silica dust in the workplace. Read More…
Jons comments: There are over 600,000 Australian workers estimated to be regularly exposed to silica dusts at work. They include miners, construction workers, farmers, engineers, bricklayers and road construction workers, as well as those working in demolition and lots of DIY people as well. The report states “Silica is surprisingly common – it’s found in stone, rock, sand, gravel and clay, as well as bricks, tiles, concrete and some plastic materials,”.
“When these materials are worked on or cut, silica is released as a fine dust that’s 100 times smaller than a grain of sand. It’s so small you can’t see it – but if you breathe it in, in some cases it can lead to lung cancer.” It is time to review your exposures to silica dusts and take preventive action: it is always a lot cheaper financially as well as psychologically to do so
Quad bikes continue to dominate farm deaths
45 people have lost their lives in on‐farm incidents and a further 144 have been involved in non‐fatal incidents in the first nine months of 2017. Read more… The Australian Centre for Agricultural Health and Safety state that “While quad manufacturers always point to rider error to avoid any implications regarding the safety of their product, with over 60 per cent of deaths in Australia involving rollovers, the lack of a lateral stability standard and crush protection means not only do they roll all too easily, but when they do, the consequences are often fatal,” and “Because of these design flaws, the margin of error for riding quads is so small that it all too often ends in tragedy. Jons comments: Clearly the use of quads for employment purposes can be expected to leave the farmer or manager exposed to OHS risk management breaches and a failure to demonstrate due diligence. The recreational use of standard quads is also very high risk. In both cases, there are much safer vehicle options as well as aftermarket retrofitting of rigid or sprung roll bars.
$175,000 fine: worker crushed by skid steer loader
A Geelong recycling company has been convicted and fined $175,000 following the death of a worker who was struck and run over by a skid steer loader at its Grovedale transfer station. Read more….
Jons comments: This is yet another example of an organisation having an OHS system on paper that was “not being monitored or adhered to” coupled with an inadequate Traffic Management system. Are your workers implementing your safety systems? I can help you to update and re-activate your safety management systems and processes if that will assist.
Major gaps in small business OHS
Eighty-one per cent of Australian small businesses don’t fully understand their workplace safety obligations while only half are confident that they meet their obligations across all areas of workplace safety, according to recent research Read more…
Jons Comments: I frequently find myself assisting small business to better understand their OHS obligations and assist them to either simplify or develop and implement practical safety procedures that match their needs. Seeking OHS solutions on Google can result in creating unnecessary complications, difficult implementation issues and greater legal exposure because you are not fully implementing your system. Whilst I enjoy this work, it would usually be cheaper and easier for these smaller businesses to get good advice first.