A Senate committee has been directed to inquire into whether the limited harmonisation of WHS laws and the increasing use of temporary workers are hampering the prevention of workplace deaths. Meanwhile, the Turnbull Government has promised to extend domestic violence leave to six million more workers, following the Fair Work Commission's ruling on the issue.
A company's failure to follow its own safety management plans, and its desire to save costs on tradespeople and engineers, led to a horror bathroom fatality and the first conviction for reckless conduct under Australia's harmonised WHS regime.
A mining company has been fined $900,000 from a maximum $3 million in the first finalised prosecution for reckless conduct under Australia's harmonised WHS laws.
Safe Work Australia has launched the public consultation process for the review of the model WHS laws, posing 37 questions for discussion and pointing to the reasons why industrial manslaughter provisions weren't included in the Act.
New industrial manslaughter laws that could be adopted nationally are clearly intended to cover a broader range of people than the WHS Act's due diligence obligations, and breaches will be far easier to prove than category 1 offences, according to safety and employment lawyer Katherine Morris.
WHS amendments that recently passed in Queensland and will be pushed nationally effectively mandate risk management, while the industrial manslaughter provisions "create conflict" in the operation of the WHS Act, according to leading health and safety lawyer Michael Tooma.
Understanding the Victorian OHS Act in the context of the model WHS regime is critical for duty holders, with superior courts, for instance, viewing the unstated objects of the former "through the prism" of the latter's broad objectives, according to the latest edition of Victoria's OHS law "bible". (Read on for your chance to win one of three copies!)