Employers seeking to address COVID-19 safety risks and comply with their WHS duties should ensure they don't create new risks, and should empower mobile workers to refuse to enter sites without adequate pandemic controls, according to new national guidance from Safe Work Australia.
Workers working remotely because of COVID-19 or other reasons are more likely to engage in self-endangering behaviours like working while ill, according to researchers, who say employees need self-management training.
In a timely study with resurgences of COVID-19 infections occurring across Australia, a new study has stressed the importance of managing the mental health needs of workers before, during and after outbreaks.
Senior WHS lawyers have warned that employers' coronavirus-related notification duties come with the requirement to preserve "incident" sites, while a regulator has warned of the risks associated with shutting down or curtailing operations for COVID-19, pointing to two overseas disasters.
Working from home can conceal, from employers, signs that workers are at risk of domestic and family violence. Managers must take steps to address this work-related issue, a senior employment lawyer says.
Healthcare professionals are currently provided with fewer COVID-19 protections than construction workers, and national guidance on face masks and other PPE must be overhauled to prevent coronavirus case numbers from soaring, according to Australia's peak workplace safety body.
A commission has stood behind its decision to stand over rather than extinguish a worker's stop-bullying application, after hearing he perceived being excluded from his workplace and otherwise bullied while working remotely for the coronavirus pandemic.
Employers that issue "worker permits" to employees capable of working from home, or without implementing a COVID Safe Plan, could be fined $100,000 under pandemic restrictions commencing in Victoria tonight. Meanwhile, NSW has established a permit system for workers entering the State from Victoria, and Queensland has closed its border to NSW, with exemptions for essential workers.
