Safe Work Australia’s progress with model work health and safety laws

Safe Work Australia is the principal national organisation that is driving the harmonisation of work health and safety laws with the aim to achieve the best possible approach to health and safety for all Australian workplaces.

Tragically, each year, there are around 300 Australians who die from work-related injuries and incidents; while around a further 135,000 individuals end up receiving compensation for serious injuries that they incur in their workplaces. The transport and storage industry has the highest incidence rate in the country, followed by the agriculture, forestry and fishing industries category. Notably, many more die each year as a result of work-related diseases.

Effectively managing workplace health and safety issues not only ensures a safer workplace for all Australians, but it also has a very significant effect on the performance and productivity of our businesses. The estimated total economic cost of work-related injuries and illnesses to the Australian economy is approximately $57.5 billion. This substantial sum of money represents just less than 6% of Australia’s gross domestic product.

Currently, the Commonwealth, states and territories are responsible for making and enforcing their own workplace health and safety laws. Although these entities all draw on a similar approach for regulating our workplaces, there are some important and significant differences in the application and detail of the laws across state and territory boundaries. It is the inconsistency of the workplace health and safety laws that makes the regulation of workplace health and safety standards across all parts of Australia very difficult.

Developing harmonised laws

This issue is now being addressed by the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) under the Intergovernmental Agreement for Regulatory and Operational Reform in Occupational Health and Safety (IGA), which commits the Commonwealth, state and territory governments to the harmonisation of workplace health and safety laws.

An independent panel completed the ‘National Review into Model Occupational Health and Safety Laws’ back in January 2009, and then submitted two comprehensive reports to the Workplace Relations Ministers’ Council (WRMC), which subsequently made recommendations for the structure and the content of a model Work Health and Safety Act.

As a result of the WRMC decisions, Safe Work Australia has worked to develop an exposure draft of the Model Work Health and Safety (WHS) Act, which was released for public comment in September 2009. In response to the exposure draft, Safe Work Australia received some 480 submissions from many areas of our community and business sectors from all over the country, including comments from individuals, unions, businesses, industry associations, government departments, academics and community organisations.

Following the review of all of these submissions, Safe Work Australia has adopted a number of the proposals received during this public comment period and submitted a revised version of the Act to the WRMC. The WRMC then endorsed the revised laws on 11 December 2009 and authorised Safe Work Australia and the Parliamentary Council’s Committee to make any further technical and drafting amendments to the Model Work Health and Safety (WHS) Act to ensure its workability.

More recently, on 29 April 2010, the members of Safe Work Australia endorsed the amendments and then produced a revised version of the Act, which has been posted on the Safe Work Australia website.

Model regulations and priority codes of practice

To further support the structure and principles outlined in the revised version of the Act, Safe Work Australia is currently in the process of developing a number of model regulations and model priority codes of practice, as well as a nationally consistent approach to compliance and enforcement policy.

This work involves the benchmarking and analysis of all of the current regulations and practical guidance material that are in existence in each of the jurisdictions, as well as the relevant national workplace and safety standards.

The Model Work Health and Safety Regulations that will be drafted for specific areas include:

• Licences - general, for example, asbestos and high-risk work;
• Workplaces - facilities, first aid, personal protection equipment and emergency management;
• Chemicals - inorganic lead, asbestos, labelling, safety data sheets and major hazard facilities;
• Other hazards - plant, manual tasks, noise, work at heights, remote and isolated work, confined spaces;
• Construction - general, excavation, demolition, scaffolding, tilt up, fragile roofing; and
• Other hazardous work - diving, abrasive blasting, fire and explosion.

The model work health and safety priority codes of practices will be drafted for specific areas that include:

• Managing work health and safety risks;
• Consultation;
• Workplace facilities, traffic management, fatigue and first aid;
• Hazardous substances - asbestos, labelling and safety data sheets;
• Other hazards - plant, manual tasks, noise, work at heights and confined spaces;
• Construction - excavation, demolition, scaffolding and tilt up; and
• Other hazardous work - diving, abrasive blasting, logging, welding and spray painting.

An exposure draft of the model work health and safety regulations and priority model codes of practices will be released for public comment in the near future. Businesses and individuals will have the opportunity to provide their comments during a four-month public consultation period that will commence in November 2010.

Under the scheduled COAG time frame, the Commonwealth, state and territory governments will be required to have enacted the model WHS Act and the model regulations by the end of December 2011.

When the harmonised work health and safety laws are in place across Australia, businesses and workers will be able to comply more easily with their work health and safety responsibilities because the requirements will largely be the same, regardless of how many states and territories they may operate in.

Harmonising the country’s work health and safety laws in this way will, as a consequence, cut any barriers caused by red tape, boost business efficiency and provide a greater certainty and levels of protection for everyone.

For more information on the harmonisation of the work health and safety laws, visit www.safeworkaustralia.gov.au.

Safe Work Australia represents a partnership between the Commonwealth, state and territory governments, the Australian Council of Trade Unions, the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, and the Australian Industry Group. On 1 November 2009, Safe Work Australia began operating as an independent statutory agency with primary responsibility to improve occupational health and safety and workers compensation arrangements across Australia.