Browsing: Authority/inspectorate (SA) | Page 2

A court has rejected a worker's claim that her employer unlawfully threatened to lodge a workers' compensation claim, against her will, after she raised safety concerns affecting her mental health.

• WHS phase-outs by IKEA and others fast-track end of deadly stone;
  
• Dozens of toilet-related WHS breaches found in SA blitz; and
  
• Worksite bystander killed.

Significant amendments were made to workplace health and safety laws in every Australian jurisdiction in the third quarter of 2023, including many increasing penalties and making it easier to prosecute duty holders. This major report - the only one of its kind in the country - examines all the need-to-know legislative changes, workers' compensation developments and court decisions from July, August and September.

Unsafe workplace layouts, and training and first-aid failings, were among the WHS issues that attracted improvement notices in a major compliance project targeting violence and aggression in a hazardous industry.

PCBUs could be handed WHS fines of up to $100,000 in civil penalty cases launched by affected parties like workers, deceased workers' families and unions, under proposed reforms that have reached the consultation phase in South Australia.

• New work safety laws and codes to follow major explosion;
  
• Two new WHS Codes of Practice made in ACT; and
  
• Roll-away alert quickly followed by serious roll-away incident.

• Climate change powers proposed for WHS committees; and
  
• WHS inspectors to wear cameras in SA.

An employer's commitment to spending nearly $1 million on safety undertakings, including piloting a drone program to eliminate fall-from-height risks, is the "preferred enforcement option" over a worker's four-metre fall, a regulator has revealed.

• WHS tool for extreme weather launched, applies to city PCBUs;
  
• Seven more safety Codes under review in NSW;
  
• WHS Codes made and varied in NT, new safety laws delayed; and
  
• Roll-away alert issued in SA.

All of Australia's eight harmonised WHS jurisdictions have now formally applied or committed to adopting provisions explicitly requiring PCBUs to manage psychosocial risks through a risk management process.