Modern Safety When safety inspection results decline, stay positive

What happens when the numbers show your safety isn?t improving? It can lead to questions whether you?ve devoted enough resources to safety, or it can even result in negative attention.

That?s what?s happening in Australia right now, according to an article in the Canberra Times. Only one in three workplaces undergoing safety inspections conducted in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) during the last financial year passed. In other words, two out of three inspections failed. ??

While the government target was 80%, only 35% of companies passed their safety inspections in 2011-12. Notably, that index in 2010-2011 financial year was around 47.5%. And looking at 2009-2010, the occupational health and safety compliance was 54%. This represents a dramatic downward trend in the percentage of workplaces complying with safety laws in Australia.

Mark McCabe, the Commissioner at WorkSafe ACT, a business unit with the ACT Justice and Community Safety Directorate?s Office of Regulatory Services, suggested one possible reason for such results. As he said to the publication, the trend can potentially reflect the focus of safety inspectors on the construction industry, ?which has been blighted this year by a record number of serious accidents and deaths.?

Moreover, there has been a drop in the number of WorkSafe ACT safety inspectors. Only 34 qualified inspectors currently supervise construction sites, compared to 68 in 2004-05. According to the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union?s ACT secretary, Dean Hall, ?inspectors were being stretched too thin with their roles involving managing compliance, policing problem worksites, promoting safety education and preparing prosecution cases.?

That?s why one possible solution is to urgently increase the number of WorkSafe inspectors monitoring construction sites for possible safety breaches.

?But I don?t think inspecting capacity on its own will solve this problem. We need to improve the culture of occupational health and safety in all workplaces,? said Simon Corbell, ACT?s Workplace Safety and Industrial Relations Minister, to Canberra Times. ?We need to be sure that businesses don?t just see it as red tape, and instead treat their safety of their workers as a matter of real importance.?

ACT Work Safety Commissioner Mark McCabe and former public service commissioner Lynelle Briggs are expected to report the findings of the ACT government?s urgent inquiry into the industry?s safety practices this Friday.

But there?s always another way to see results like this. Here, for example, one out of three safety inspections did pass ? and can provide insight into what?s working well. The urgency around solutions such as increasing the number of safety inspectors, and meeting to discuss industry safety practices, is a good thing.

There?s always room to improve safety ? whether it?s been a good year or a bad one.

Tags: safety inspections, safety inspectors

Source: http://blog.fieldid.com/2012/11/when-safety-inspection-results-decline-stay-positive/

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