Safetysure

Recycling company fined over multiple work safety incidents

A Melbourne Recycling Company has faced court and been fined $115K for failing to maintain a safe workplace after multiple fall and machine guarding incidents. The incident provides learning for industries reliant on the use of plant and machinery.

According to the Victorian Work Safety Safety Regulator, SKM Services Pty Ltd was convicted and fined in the Melbourne Magistrates’ Court on August…

Tips to Help Keep Your Employees Safe from Cyber Bullying

As businesses move to working remotely in the midst of COVID-19, reports of cyber bullying and online discrimination have been on the increase. While we tend to think that cyber bullying only happens to kids, it is clear that Cyber Bullying has become a known work health and safety issue. It can affect mental health in the workplace and leave employees off for a compensatable injury. In this…

Working from Home | Quick Stretches To Do At Your Desk

While many of us have moved to working from home during the pandemic, there’s a range of health & safety considerations that go with working at home. Desk work is one of them. In this article we explore some simple steps to stretching at work.

Working at a desk is one of the many ways that you can damage your health and that people in modern life find themselves with a variety of complaints…

How HR Planning Can Reduce COVID-19 Business Impacts

There has been a steady rise in the confirmed COVID-19 cases within Australia and across the world. This unprecedented circumstance has left many employers at a crossroads. Employers are now left to grapple with the unforeseen impact that this disease will have on their businesses and their employees. So, what can employers do during these trying times? Here are some HR planning tips that you can…

Tips to Stop Workplace Bullying

Workplace bullying can be a significant issue in the workplace and has been a frequent reason for compensation claims and work safety complaints to regulators. There’s ample evidence that the practice has continued in some workplaces and it often presents business owners significant challenges. In this article we take a look at workplace bullying and provide some tips to help safely control it at…

Keeping your coffee shop COVID-19 safe

As part of re-opening up coffee businesses, employers are now required to implement plans to manage the risk of exposure from communicable diseases like Coronavirus COVID-19. This means ensuring that employee and customer exposure to the disease is managed. We’ve assembled some simple tips on how you can achieve this as part of your coffee shop re-opening plan.

Tip One – Train your staff Ke…

Transitioning employees back to work after COVID-19 lock downs

Employers are frequently asking us about the process of transitioning employees back to the workplace as COVID-19 restrictions ease. How should we manage the transition to work? what precautions do we need to take? what if employees are concerned with returning? Is there any documentation requirements that we need to adopt? Unfortunately there are no simple answers when it comes to transitioning.…

Safety questions for post-COVID-19 success in Smart and Safe Automation

Now that the world is slowly re-opening industries to enable the recovery of badly hit economies and save jobs, the key question remains on how best to move forward in automating as much as possible, while retaining jobs, and keeping facilities and employees safe? Safety and cybersecurity expert Friedhelm Best, Vice President Asia Pacific, HIMA shares his thoughts with Safetysure.

Safety and…

New changes to NSW work health and safety

A number of new changes to work health and safety in NSW have been made following the passing of the Work Health and Safety Amendment (Review) Act 2020 in June 2020.

The key aspects of the changes to the Work Health & Safety Act 2011 include:

Enhancement of the Category 1 offence by including “gross negligence” as a fault element – To make it easier to prosecute and create a stronger…

Victorian workplace manslaughter law

New Victorian Workplace manslaughter laws have come into effect from 1 July 2020. The new laws have implemented changes to the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (Victoria) particularly those involving industrial or workplace manslaughter. The new laws provide a range of obligationsfor employers and persons in charge of a business unit PCBU and impose the possibility for a range of penalties…

Respirator quality concerns are emerging after fake and substandard respirators have flooded the market

Over the last several months there has been a surge in demand for respirators (masks) in the Australia market. Much of the demand has been driven by the incidence of bush fires over December January 2020 period and later by the impacts of COVID-19. Unfortunately, the high demand in respiratory protection has resulted in a range of products entering the Australian market that may not meet…

Tips for making your conference and exhibition facilities COVID Safe

Conference and exhibition safety – Conference and exhibition facilities can be challenging when it comes to prevention of communicable diseases. With tens or hundreds of people in a room, there is no doubt there will be plenty of challenges for conference and exhibition organisers to manage their work health and safety obligations effectively.

Here’s our tips for preparing your conference…

Brisbane Directors convicted under industrial manslaughter legislation

Two directors of a Brisbane wrecking yard have been convicted and sentenced under industrial manslaughter legsilation after a worker was struck with a forklift and died at their worksite in May 2019. The case clearly demonstrates the consequences of failure to manage and implement traffic management plans at worksites.

The case (see link to judgement) was brought against Brisbane Auto…

According to Workplace Health and Safety Queensland, a man has sustained significant crush injuries after a runaway vehicle crushed him at a gate post.

Queensland’s safety regulator confirmed that in “April 2020, a man suffered serious injuries after being crushed by a frontend loader. Initial enquiries found the operator got out of the cabin to untie a hay bale when the vehicle started…

Brisbane construction company fined for failure to manage critical risk on a worksite where a worker was electrocuted.

A Brisbane construction company has been fined for a safety failure to ensure a critical risk was managed on a construction work site.

The company was recently fined $85,000 in the Brisbane Magistrate’s Court after a concrete worker contacted an overhead powerline with a bull float (tool).

The worker received an electric shock, causing serious injuries including the amputation of five toes,…

Working from home safety

Working from home presents itself with many challenges including dealing with distractions that creep into work life. While we take it that our homes are our places of comfort, they also must be a place of safety when it comes to our work.

Over the past month or two, many of us have adapted our working routines to work from home. The principles for safe work at home are not dissimilar to…

National COVID-19 safe workplace principles

COVID-19 safe workplace principles have been developed accross Australia to assist in managing workplaces safer.

Recognising that the COVID-19 pandemic is a public health emergency, that all actions in respect of COVID-19 should be founded in expert health advice and that the following principles operate subject to the measures agreed and implemented by Governments through the National Cabinet…