Occupational Health and Safety (OHS)

About occupational health and safety (OHS) legislation

The term ‘occupational health and safety’ refers to the concept of ensuring that all workplaces provide a safe and healthy environment for their employees and others entering the workplace. This concept aims to reduce work-related injuries and disease that can occur within workplaces.

The Federal Government is moving towards a national approach to OHS. Currently, workplaces must abide by their state or territory OHS legislation unless they are a Commonwealth authority or a corporation operating under a self-insurance license under the Safety, Rehabilitation & Compensation Act 1988, known as the Comcare scheme.

The current system of both Commonwealth and state/territory OHS legislation also means that there are differences between the legislative requirements of each state/territory in regards to OHS.

In general,OHS is based on a systematic approach to ensuring the health, safety and welfare of all employees and others at places of work. To achieve this,occupational health and safety legislation sets objectives. The objectives are to:

secure and promote the health, safety and welfare of people at work
protect people at a place of work against risks to health or safety arising from work activities
promote a safe and healthy work environment
provide for consultation and co-operation between employers and employees on OHS issues
ensure that risks to health and safety at a place of work are identified, assessed and eliminated or controlled
develop and promote community awareness of occupational health and safety issues
obtain a progressively higher standard of occupational health and safety.

To ensure these objectives are met, OHS legislation places duties and obligations on everyone at work, regardless of the type of work, type of industry or the conditions or circumstances in which the work is carried out.

Ensuring that these objectives are met will not only provide compliance with the legislation, but will safeguard your workplace or event from any unforeseen incidents or accidents and the possible negative publicity they may bring.

There are many elements to consider and address in meeting the OHS objectives within a work environment. Some of these elements are:

OHS obligations—clearly stating the OHS obligations of everyone within the work environment
consultation—ensuring that employers consult with employees on OHS issues that affect them at work
risk management—developing and implementing strategies and tools for identifying, assessing and controlling workplace hazards
training—developing and implementing a training plan that will provide for skilled management and employees in maintaining a safe workplace
records and record keeping—setting up and maintaining a record-keeping system that provides for all OHS initiatives undertaken in the workplace to be recorded and keeping those records for the required legal period
injury management—a program that ensures injuries are managed quickly and appropriately within the workplace and that provides for an early return to work where possible.

Assess safety risks – Solo Activity 1