Category: consultation

“show me the bodies”

Significant changes in occupational health and safety result from one or more work-related fatalities. To my knowledge, this has not been labelled anyone’s “rule”, but it is a sad truism, and there are examples everywhere.

Episode One of the BBC’s excellent Grenfell podcast series references the phrase “show me the bodies” as having been said by a British bureaucrat requesting more evidence of the risks of external cladding on high-rise apartments. Such a thoughtless request implies that nothing needs to be done until there is evidence of a significant likelihood of death.

However, this article is not about Grenfell Tower (which will be coming soon) but about occupational health and safety (OHS) consultation and its failure.

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The Human Resources changes required for mentally safe workplaces.

In a recent LinkedIn discussion Professor Johanna Macneil asked me how the Human Resources (HR) discipline should change to meet the “new” occupational health and safety (OHS) duties about psychosocial hazards. Below is my response:

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The two approaches to psychosocial hazards

There are two common approaches to addressing and preventing psychosocial hazards at work.  One is to consider these hazards as originating within and affecting only workers and work processes. This looks at the hazards generated by work that affect work and downplays or dismisses factors from outside work.  The other is to acknowledge that work is part of life, that socioeconomic factors affect workers’ mental health, and that job stresses similarly affect workers’ social lives. In both instances, the use of “worker” includes all levels of a management structure. Both approaches need evaluation for effectiveness.

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Digitalisation, Artificial Intelligence, OHS and Work

What do Safe Work Australia (SWA) executives do outside National Safe Work Month? Several times each year, they appear before Senate committees. Recently, SWA’s CEO Marie Boland, Sinead McHugh, and Katherine Taylor spoke at a Senate Inquiry into the Digital Transformation of Workplaces.

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“don’t trick people” – Greenwashing and Safewashing

Nobel-prize winner Joseph Stiglitz does not write about occupational health and safety (OHS). However, he does write about the sociopolitical and economic context in which businesses operate and from which worker health and safety decisions are made. In August 2024, Stiglitz is touring Australia. On August 7, 2024, he addressed a packed auditorium in Melbourne.

The topic was Greenwashing. He shared the stage with Senator Sarah Hanson-Young and Polly Hemming. The event, and I think the tour, was sponsored by The Australia Institute. Why was an OHS professional at a greenwashing lecture? The tools, techniques, and preventions of greenwashing are often echoed in OHS.

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Sentencing and OHS prosecutions but few solutions

Most submissions to the inquiry into Sentencing Occupational Health and Safety Offences in Victoria are now publicly available.  They raise a lot of different issues and some grumbles even though the Sentencing Advisory Council provided some structure to the topics it wanted addressed.

A major purpose of any penalty is to deter harmful and damaging actions from being repeated.  SAC reiterates that any sentence 

  • deters the offender and others from committing similar offences;
  • punishes the offender in a just manner;
  • facilitates the rehabilitation of the offender;
  • denounces the behaviour that the offender engaged in, and
  • protects the community from the offender. (page 7)

The CFMEU’s Dr Gerry Ayers opens his submission with Deterrence by quoting Gunningham and Johnstone from 1999, who wrote:

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Is the Psych Health and Safety Conference worth attending?

Recently, Sydney, Australia, experienced the inaugural Psych Health and Safety conference managed by Flourishdx, a prominent Australian consultancy that identifies and helps companies manage psychosocial hazards at work. There were around 400 delegates in person and online. The conference was a gamble for Flourishdx, and it largely paid off, but contrary to some of the overly effusive posts on LinkedIn, it was a curious beast.

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