A safety regulator will be notified of all dust-disease claims and target relevant workplaces under recommendations to a parliamentary inquiry, which heard that occupational lung disease is significantly under-recognised in NSW.
New OHS and equipment Regulations have commenced in Victoria, while other reforms and legislative instruments are expected to take effect within the next two weeks and later this year.
Safety and workers' comp laws are being amended in Queensland to allow dust victims to "re-open" lump sum claims, and crackdown on dodgy electrical work - a move driven by a workplace fatality and coronial inquest.
In a "precedent-setting case", former asbestos producer James Hardie has been ordered to pay exemplary damages to a man with malignant mesothelioma, after a court found it put profits ahead of his safety when it sold him asbestos products it knew could kill.
Bills establishing Australia's "most comprehensive" safety laws for building products and a labour-hire licensing scheme have been introduced in Queensland. The State has also passed laws cracking down on infection-control breaches and improving transport safety.
Non-smoking workers exposed to mixtures of occupational vapours, gases, dusts and fumes can experience the same decline in lung capacity as a 20-packs-per-year smoker, US researchers have found.
A senior HSE advisor sustained a psychological injury after being pressured to fast-track the engagement of a new asbestos-removal contractor on the National Broadband Network, a tribunal has found in another case relying on the recently clarified admin-action test.
New safety Regulations have been made under three statutes in Victoria, and will commence at about the same time as proposed amendments to the OHS Act.
