Wherever you work in Australia, there are laws to make sure all workplaces are safe and healthy. These laws set out what everyone should be doing to make sure working conditions are safe. Employers have a responsibility to provide relevant information to all employees, contractors and visitors safety… performance must be continuously reviewed and improved. Employers also need to make sure there are systems in place to resolve issues and minimize the impact of any incidents. However, employees also have a responsibility to follow all policies and procedures to make sure they don’t put themselves in danger or anybody else. Employees are also required to report hazards near misses and accidents.
Remember, accidents cost a lot in pain, time and money. There are regulations and codes of practices that detail how you should carry out your day-to-day operations safely. These can be used in court as evidence, so you need to know how they affect your workplace.
An accident is something that was not intended. Saying it was an accident is not an excuse at work. It is our duty of care to ourselves and our coworkers. That makes everyone responsible for preventing accidents. Pay attention to the things that are going on around you and remember, make certain that all hazard and risks have been removed and you’ll be able to work safe.
The four principles of O H S: identify hazards, assess risks, control risks, review control measures. It is important that both employers and employees are involved in identifying and eliminating workplace hazards. Legislation has outlined several ways of involving employees in health and safety, including designated work groups, health and safety representatives and committees, issue resolution procedures as a work experience. Participant is not an employee. All discussions must take place with the host, supervisor, work experience, community liaison, and their case manager.
Workplace hazards can be put into the following categories. Physical includes noise, vibration, extremes of temperature, clutter, electrical, fire, poor ventilation and lighting, chemical relating to hazardous liquids, solids, gas, and infectious substances. Environmental includes hazards relating to equipment design, incorrect handling, occupational overuse, slips and falls. Human behavior includes fatigue, skill levels, noise, boredom, harassment, discrimination and abuse. Biological, this category includes hazards such as infections, bacteria, and viruses. As an employee or work experience participant, you’re expected to communicate, consult and use risk management principles to identify and eliminate hazards in the workplace. Health and safety must be constantly monitored and audited to continually improve performance. If you sustain an injury resulting from a work related accident, seek first aid treatment if required, report the accident or injury to your manager’s, supervisor or workplace health and safety officer on the day of the accident. Complete an accident incident report form employees and work experience participants can help to prevent future incidents by working with employers, hosts, community liaison coordinators, and case managers to identify causes and eliminate risk.
Risk assessment. Assessing the significant risk factors involved in every task you do and putting into place measures to reduce or eliminate these risks as a work experience participant, your work experience community liaison coordinator or case manager will have already completed a risk assessment with assistance from the host. The five steps in risk assessment, document the activity, identify the hazards, document the control measures, identify who is responsible, monitor and review. The hierarchy of control must be followed in the following order When addressing a hazard risk elimination, removing the risk substituting using a better or less risky piece of equipment or substance engineering controls. Finding ways to better design the work area such as better ventilation, redesigning the layout or enclosing the area. If these are not productive or feasible methods of controlling the risk, then it’s possible to use methods which generally rely on human elements to work.
