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SOS is proud to work in conjunction with the highly respected law firm Piper Alderman. All SOS clients have access to specialised OHS legal advice ensuring the efficient delivery of both OHS technical and legal services.
Issue 17: May 2011
Hi and welcome to our May Simple Safety Update.
It continues to be a very busy year and the end of financial year is looming. SOS has been working with the Centre for Excellence in Child and Family Welfare to deliver training across Victoria in the family and youth sector and providing legal advice on the application of the new Act to foster carers. We have also been working with the transport industry through the Safety Assist project. See the links to these projects in our Simple Links.
OHS News
As reported in OHS Alert a motivations, attitudes, perceptions, and skills survey gave 762 Australians working in five high-risk industries a list of 10 possible "motivators", and asked them how much each would encourage them to take action to improve health and safety at work.
The top motivator, endorsed by nearly 90 per cent of respondents, was “wanting to do the job more easily or efficiently". Studies continue to show that the most effective safety programs focus on making sure that processes designed to improve safety also make the job easy to do.
So the message is make sure your safety systems are designed to help your people work better AND safer. Simple OHS Solutions specialises in designing safety systems which work with human behaviour, are of course simple and effective.
Harmonisation Countdown – 7
Only 217 days til the new Work Health and Safety legislation is here. South Australia has already put the legislation to their parliament and the Queensland legislation has been passed. The other states and Territories will follow soon.
Did you know?
If you use labour hire workers or contractors and they are injured on your site you can be pursued for the costs of any work cover claim by the workers compensation regulator. In addition your workers compensation insurance won’t cover you. So effectively you are uninsured for labour hire or contractors injuries if you don’t have the right private insurance. You must check your private insurances to make sure you have proper public liability insurance to cover any such claims. The costs can be significant particularly if the injury is serious and there is a claim for common law damages, which can run to $100’s of thousands of dollars.
Simple Safety Stuff Ups
Not the best place for a nap.
Simple Links
The Skeleton Project – Baring the bones on workplace safety
Worksafe Victoria
Where are the injury hotspots in your industry?
Safety Institute of Australia Membership
CFECFW – OHS Champion Project
OHS Events
Work Safe Week will be held from 17 – 21 October 2011. Put it in your diary and keep checking back to the WorkSafe Victoria website for updates closer to the time.
