The ACT's WHS Act could be amended to transfer the authority to initiate prosecutions from the Director of Public Prosecutions to the WHS regulator or commissioner, in a move that some stakeholders believe would increase the number of duty holders held to account and better deter unsafe workplace practices.
A WHS regulator has called for members of the public to report any substandard safety practices they witness, and warned that the absence of suitable workplace amenities continues to be a major problem in one industry.
The jailing of a business owner for industrial manslaughter, the commencement of a mirror WHS Act, legislative changes across most jurisdictions, and a host of judgments on work-related COVID matters, are just some of the issues covered by OHS Alert's first major review report of the year.
WHS reforms targeting the multiple subsectors in Canberra that deal with the hazardous substance silica will start taking effect from this month, under a two-tranche strategy announced today.
In a long-running state-of-connection case, a worker who was injured in NSW has, for the second time, been permitted to pursue damages in a jurisdiction with more generous common law rights, because he was "usually based" there.
The latest defendant to be sentenced over the death of a worker at a Canberra site breached its WHS duty to say "no" to the principal contractor's unsafe demands, a court has found in fining it twice as much as the principal.
A WHS regulator has promised to respond to all workplace health and safety incidents with "firm enforcement and compliance actions", after a PCBU pleaded guilty to a fatality-related contravention. Another regulator has issued a carbon monoxide warning, following a recent death and in light of heavy rains.
