WHS policies, procedures, processes and systems
At a minimum, organisations must have an employee with designated responsibility for WHS. Larger organisations may appoint a Health and Safety Representative and should ensure that a WHS committee remains active with reporting and follow-up; a committee is only mandatory for organisations if staff requests. Health and safety committees bring together workers and management to assist in developing and reviewing workplace health and safety policies and procedures.
The functions of the health and safety committee are:
- Such other procedures prescribed by the regulations or agreed between
Australian Wollongong store and the committee. - To facilitate cooperation and workers in instigating, developing and
Carrying out measures designed to ensure the health and safety of workers. - To assist in developing standards, rules and procedures relative to health.
And safety.
This policy aims to ensure that work is carried out safely, following Australian hardware’s ethical and legal obligation to provide and maintain a safe workplace. Australian hardware recognises its responsibility to provide a healthy and safe working environment for employees, contractors, clients, and visitors. Australian hardware is committed to ensuring that all employees are safe from injury and health risks whilst undertaking work-related duties. Management of the Australian Wollongong store staff responsible for:
- They are providing and maintaining a safe and healthy environment for work.
- Employees provide training, supervision and support to ensure a safe and healthy workplace.
- Consultation with employees regarding health and safety changes to legislation that may affect the workplace
The process and system play a vital role in the organisation; some of them are establishing a safe and healthy workplace, ensuring compliance with all relevant legislation, consulting employees and affected person on health and safety issues, detecting hazards leading to assessment and appropriate control activities for all risks in the workplace, establish and commit to a health and safety management system and continual improvements including internal audit and systematic management review. Provides written procedures and instructions for safe working practices and material safety data sheets where required.
Work health and safety act 2011
The work health and safety act 2011 (the WHS Act) provides a framework to protect the health, safety and welfare of all workers at work. It also protects the health and safety of all other people affected by the outcome.
In this Act, reasonably practicable, concerning a duty to ensure health and safety means that which is, or was at a particular time, well able to be done about providing health and safety, taking into account and weighing up all relevant matters, including Work Health and Safety Act 2011.
- The likelihood of the hazard or the risk concerned occurring,
- The degree of harm that might result from the danger or the risk,
- The availability and suitability of ways to eliminate or minimise the risk,
- After assessing the extent of the risk and the available methods of removing or minimising the risk, the cost associated with available ways of eliminating or minimising the risk, including whether the price is grossly disproportionate to the risk.
Code of Practices
Cod practice codes of practice are practical guides. Achieving the standard codes of practice are valuable guides to achieving the health, safety and welfare standards required under work health and safety and the regulation in jurisdictions. These methods codes are based on the model codes of practices developed by safe work Australia through consultation.
The Codes of Practice are:
- Are to be read and construed with the WHS Act and the WHS regulations,
- Guide on meeting obligations under the WHS Act and Regulations are admissible in proceedings under the WHS Act and Regulations as evidence of what is known about a hazard, risk or control and what is reasonably practicable.
In most cases, following an approved code of practice would achieve compliance with the health and safety duties in the WHS Act about the subject matter of the principle. Like regulations, codes deal with particular issues and do not cover all hazards or risks that may arise. The relevant duty requires not only those for which laws and codes of practices exist to consider but to consider all risk that comes with associate works.
Roles and responsibilities of WHS
Australian Wollongong store staff is committed to ensuring the health, safety and welfare of its employees, students, visitors and contractors. As such, the University Executive and management have workplace health and safety (WHS) responsibilities, authority and accountabilities as outlined in position descriptions, policies, guidelines, and procedures and summarised in this document. Duties for WHS are legislated in the Work Health and Safety Act (WHS) 2011. The Act details the responsibilities of a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU), officers and workers, as well as suppliers and manufacturers
The following principle applies to all duties in the WHS Act 2011:
- Duty is not transferable
- A person may have more than one duty
- More than one person can have the same duty
- risks are managed to ensure they are eliminated or minimised, so far as
It is reasonably practicable.
WHS consultation barriers and overcoming it
There are many barriers to communicating and consulting with each other in the workplace. Finding the right time and delivering messages in the right way can be challenging. Workers and HSRs should establish relationships with their managers to encourage open and honest discussion and mutual trust. Consultation often fails due to lack of clarity of message, absences of emotional resonance in your message, inaccurate targeting, etc., between HSRs and staff workers.
There are many tips to reduce barriers through communication:
- Engage people on an emotional level
- Provide clear messages with concrete examples to help people focus their energies
- Think about what you say and how you say it
- Written material should be backed up by verbal communication
- Check the tone of the communication
- Some news is better than no news
- Let people know the status of what is happening; you are the key to communicating change. Workers look to you to see if there is genuine acceptance.
