Forty misconduct matters are under investigation and a new workplace investigations unit will be established in the wake of the New South Wales Fire Brigade misconduct inquiry.

Last year an inquiry panel, overseen by the Director General of the Department of Premier and Cabinet, was set up to review allegations of widespread bullying, harassment and other misconduct in the NSW Fire Brigade.

‘A key weakness identified by the inquiry panel was the lack of adequate resources within the NSW Fire Brigades to appropriately investigate and scrutinise reported workplace misconduct allegations, and also work towards preventing such incidents,’ NSW Minister for Emergency Services, Steve Whan said.

Since the allegations were made, nearly 40 matters are now the subject of police and other investigations or the judicial process.

The workplace conduct and investigations unit is being set up in response to the inquiry’s findings and will cost $1.3 million.

The new unit will be dedicated to investigating and preventing bullying, harassment and other misconduct complaints and incidents.

For more details, visit the NSW Govt

A Victorian magistrate has ordered an employer to pay more than half a million dollars to charities after a worker was seriously injured in a post-peeler incident.

The 40-year-old worker became entangled while feeding a pine post into the unguarded peeler at Jelfor Treated Timbers Pty Ltd in Traralgon, Victoria, in 2008.

The worker sustained a number of serious injuries, including the amputation of his left arm, a fractured skull, a punctured lung, broken ribs and a dislocated right arm.

WorkSafe Victoria prosecuted Jelfor Treated Timbers Pty Ltd and its company director Maxwell Jelleff in the LaTrobe Valley Court. The company and the director pleaded guilty.

Magistrate Vandersteen convicted the company and ordered it to pay $230,000 to Helimed One and $230,000 to the court fund.

Jelleff escaped conviction, but was ordered to pay $40,000 to the Royal Children’s Hospital and $40,000 to Make-A-Wish Foundation of Australia.

‘Disappointingly, the post-peeler in which this worker became entangled – suffering life-changing injuries – could have been safely guarded for about $5,000,’ acting executive director for health and safety Stan Krpan said.

‘Instead of putting this guarding in place, the company chose to ignore the risks. This meant workers operating the machinery had to expose themselves to moving parts, like drive chains and rotating blades, in order to do their job.’

For more details, visit WorkSafe Victoria

The number of deaths due to mesothelioma has risen, while the number of new cases diagnosed has decreased.

In 2006, 579 new cases of mesothelioma were diagnosed in Australia, compared to 605 cases in 2005, said the recent report, “Mesothelioma in Australia, Incidence: 1982 – 2006, Mortality 1997 – 2007”.

In 2007, 551 people died from mesothelioma – 75 more than last year. Of these deaths, 464 (84) per cent were of men and 87 (16) per cent were of women.

The incidence of mesothelioma isn’t expected to peak until after 2010, due to its long latency period. Some studies have indicated the incidence isn’t expected to peak until between 2014 and 2021.

For more details, visit Safe Work Australia

Adhering to prescribed hazard control is a must under the new fall prevention code of practice that was recently released pending the start of the model OHS laws in January 2012.

The National Code of Practice for the Prevention of Falls in Housing Construction (Housing Falls Code) supports the National Standard for Construction Work (2005).

Safe Work Australia’s (SWA) predecessor, the Australian Safety and Compensation Council, developed the code before work started on the model OHS legislation.

The code stipulates that a prescribed hierarchy of hazard control must be considered when working at heights above 2 metres.

When controlling fall hazards using the hierarchy, duties holders must first consider if the work can be moved to the ground or a solid construction.

If not, duty holders must consider using a passive fall prevention device, followed by a work positioning system, then a fall-arrest system.

If these controls aren’t reasonably practicable then the work must be undertaken using ladders, or administrative controls.

The code also stipulates that when working at a height of less than 2 metres, non-prescribed risk management should be adopted.

For more details, visit SWA.

A Perth labour-hire company has been fined after a farm worker died from injuries he sustained in an all-terrain vehicle (ATV) incident.

The farm worker was riding an ATV without a helmet, alone, on a client’s farm when he rode into a wire gate in 2008.

He was found on the side of the road the next day with serious head injuries. He died in hospital two days later.

WorkSafe WA prosecuted labour-hire company Seatown Holdings Pty Ltd in the Perth Magistrates Court for breaching the Western Australia OHS Act.

The company pleaded guilty and was fined $30,000.

‘The court heard that the workers on the farm involved were riding the ATV without wearing helmets as a matter of course, and that the wire gate was difficult to see,’ WorkSafe WA Commissioner Nina Lyhne said.

‘The labour hire company that supplied the worker had not visited the farm at any time during the six months the man had been working there to check for hazards, identify risks and consider control measures.’

Farm Safe said over the past decade 130 people had died in farm-related quad bike incidents nationally.

The Heads of Workplace Safety Authorities (HWSA) across Australia and New Zealand have recently started a quad bike safety program, investigating quad bike design, safety equipment, training and instruction, aftermarket accessories, safe use and point of sale.

For more information, visit WorkSafeWA and the HWSA

Further research is required following the inconclusive Interphone brain cancer research results.

Interphone researchers interviewed 2,708 mobile phone users diagnosed with glioma and 2,409 diagnosed with meningioma in 13 countries, including Australia.

‘Overall, no increase in risk of either glioma or meningioma was observed in association with use of mobile phones,’ said the Interphone study, published recently in the “International Journal of Epidemiology 2010”.

‘There were suggestions of an increased risk of glioma, and much less so meningioma, at the highest exposure levels, for ipsilateral exposures and, for glioma, for tumours in the temporal lobe.

‘However, biases and errors limit the strength of the conclusions we can draw from these analyses and prevent a causal interpretation.’

Dr Christopher Wild, Director of International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) and member of the Interphone study group, said although the study failed to establish an increased risk of brain cancer, further research was required.

‘…observations at the highest level of cumulative call time and the changing patterns of mobile phone use since the period studied by Interphone, particularly in young people, mean that further investigation of mobile phone use and brain cancer risk is merited’.

For more details visit, the Interphone study and IACR

Tobacco marketing that targets women is the focus of this year’s World No Tobacco Day on May 31.

Women were a major target of the tobacco industry ‘because comparatively few women use tobacco in either its smoked or its chewed form’, the World Health Organization (WHO) said.

‘For example, only about 9 per cent of women smoke, compared with 40 per cent of men. Of the world’s over 1 billion smokers, only about 200 million are women.’

In some countries, tobacco use among women was increasing, and as many girls smoke cigarettes as boys.

WHO said the current trends were concerning because teenagers who smoke were more likely to become regular adult smokers.

Approximately 1.5 million women died from tobacco use each year. ‘Unless urgent action is taken, tobacco use could kill more than eight million people by 2030, of whom 2.5 million would be women,’ WHO said.

‘Approximately three-quarters of these female deaths would occur in the low-income and middle-income countries that are least able to absorb such losses.’

For more details, visit WHO

A separate drug cabinet would have saved the life of a mother who had just given birth, a UK court has been told.

Thirty-year-old Mayra Cabrera died from a drug mix up at the National Health Service (NHS) Marlborough Road hospital in Swindon in May 2004.

Cabrera, who was also a nurse at the hospital, was injected in the arm with an epidural drug instead of saline solution and died an hour later from complications.

UK Health and Safety Executive (HSE) and Wiltshire Police investigations found the two drugs were stored in the same racking system, despite having almost identical packaging.

The NHS was prosecuted and pleaded guilty in the Bristol Crown Court last week and fined £75,000 for breaching the UK OHS Act. The NHS was also ordered to pay costs of £25,000.

‘This was an absolutely heartbreaking case to investigate. Mayra Cabrera needlessly died as a result of comprehensive management failings at board, pharmacy and ward level,’ HSE Inspector, Liam Osborne said after the hearing.

‘Had the hospital done something as simple as keeping these completely different but almost identical-looking drugs in separate cupboards, then Mrs Cabrera would not have died.’

For more details, visit the HSE

Institutional and legal barriers are being blamed for a significant proportion of dismissed or withdrawn whistleblower claims in the US.

Sixty three per cent of OHS whistleblower claims were dismissed and 14 per cent were withdrawn in the 2009 US fiscal year.

The US Occupational Health and Safety Administration (OSHA) received 2,160 complaints and completed 1,947 investigations in 2009. Only 3 per cent of the completed claims were recommended for litigation or found to have merit, and 20 per cent were settled. The start of 2010 fiscal year is reflecting the same trend.

‘I do not believe that the vast majority of whistleblower claims are simply without merit,’ US Assistant Secretary of Labor for Occupational Safety and Health David Michaels said.

‘Instead, it appears to me that there are a series of institutional, administrative and legislative barriers that stand between many whistleblowers and justice.

‘These barriers, and our failure to protect legitimate whistleblowers creates an injustice for these workers, and it discourages other workers from asserting rights.’

Michaels said the problem was a ‘patchwork’ of 17 statutes that OSHA was required to enforce and a lack of resources to manage the backlog of cases.

He said strengthened laws and more funding was required.

Meanwhile, he said a top-to-bottom review of OSHA’s whistleblower protection program would be undertaken.

For more detail, visit OSHA

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2009 National Safety Awards of Excellence winner CRT Group reflect on a year that was

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Last Chance - Melbourne Safety Connect

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Topic: Environmental Sustainability

Presenter: Mr Neil Jaycock (Environmental Sustainability Specialist)

As the co-ordinator for the Emergency response Unit for the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA) Neil ensured the Authority met its responsibilities under the state’s disaster plans and Marine Pollution Contingency Plan.

Neil is an authority on environmental sustainability and has worked with many business and government organisations across a broad range of environmental risk management issues.

Having just coordinated a one week intensive subject on Engineering for Sustainable Solutions at Melbourne University, Neil will condense this learning to answer the difficult environmental questions.

Should you buy a carbon offset?

Is Zero Carbon Emission a feasible objective?

Why peak loads and smart meters will be part of our future.

How to be a good NABER & NGER.

Topic: Environmental Sustainability in Sport

Presenter: Mr Campbell Rose (CEO Western Bulldogs)

Campbell has been the Chief Executive Officer of the Western Bulldogs since 2003. He has a proud history as an America’s Cup and Olympic Yachtsman.

In his eight years at the Bulldogs, Campbell has overseen a remarkable turnaround in the finances and balance sheet of the Club as well as a marked improvement in both the Bulldogs team performances and the Clubs reputation. He has personally led the redevelopment of Whitten Oval to what it is today, a true environmentally sustainable community hub and icon of the Western Suburbs.

A successful manager, board member, and innovator Campbell has had to manage the environmental issues surrounding the property infrastructure projects of the Western Bulldogs.

Campbell will present his learning’s from his amazing turnaround of the Western Bulldogs with particular focus on the environmental and sustainability issues he has been required to address.

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Leading OHS Manager

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