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Hand washing and safety
The appearance of a new coronavirus (Covid19) has again thrown a focus on hand hygiene. This is an occupational health and safety (OHS) issue as the risk could appear at work and, in Australia,...
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The Triumph of Doubt is essential reading
When a former head of a national occupational health and safety (OHS) regulator writes a book, it may be a curiosity (and it is rare). But when the writer is the former Assistant Secretary of Labor...
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The gig tightrope over a receding tide
The Australia Institute conducted a webinar on Australia’s economic future during and after the COVID19 pandemic. Former Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan and economist Richard Denniss were the featured...
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Important safety, environmental, political and personal stories in book on...
Dr Tom Doig has continued to build on his earlier work about the Morwell mine fire, expanding his “The Coal Face” from 2015 into his new book “Hazelwood” (after court-related injunctions, now...
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Exclusive Interview with Dr Tom Doig
SafetyAtWorkBlog had the chance to put some questions to Dr Tom Doig in early 2019 prior to the book’s release. Below is that exclusive interview. SAWB: “Hazelwood” is predominantly a book that...
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Work-related elements for social change
It is almost impossible for occupational health and safety (OHS) people to stop looking at the world through the risk assessment parameters and hierarchies with which they work every day. The...
View ArticleNoisy Buggers in the Post-COVID world
Guest Post by Melody Kemp In my more bizarre moments, I can imagine the cockpit conversation: ‘Hey Bill, there’s the blue and white house. We turn left here’‘Bob, Copy. Over.’ Of course, it’s nonsense...
View ArticleSDG trumps ESG
Environmental Social Governance (ESG) initiatives are receiving a shellacking at the moment, with many of the same arguments raised against ESG’s related concept several years ago, Corporate Social...
View ArticleWhere do you see yourself in five years’ time?
Occupational health and safety (OHS) laws continue to be relevant even when operating in a time of a highly infectious pandemic, but they are increasingly sidelined. At the moment there are labour...
View ArticleWhat does the IPCC report on climate change say about work?
Global warming will affect the way we work. This was acknowledged in the most recent report from the International Panel on Climate Change. The 3,676-page report cited several research papers related...
View ArticleHeat and the need to change work
Europe is experiencing heat at, or close to, levels never recorded before. This has caused the mainstream media to issue advice on how to avoid adverse health impacts from heat exposure. However, the...
View Article“There is too little time and the ask is too big to try to change the system”.
There are many similarities between the management of occupational health and safety (OHS) and environment protection. Both seek to prevent and/or mitigate harm, and both have similarly focussed...
View ArticleWill firewalking become the norm?
Occupational health and safety (OHS) will have little effect on reducing the pace of global warming. Still, OHS will definitely need to assist in changing how we continue to work in future weather...
View ArticleWill WorkSafe need to become a VicSafe to address climate change?
Occupational health and safety (OHS) professionals are largely aware of the latest international standard for OHS management systems, ISO45001. This is the core standard for businesses to assess their...
View ArticleExtreme heat
Global warming is affecting how we work just as much as how we live. Working in Heat policies are designed based on experience rather than meteorological and climate forecasts, meaning these documents...
View ArticleResearch indicates OHS strategies
Last week, the Institute for Safety, Compensation and Recovery Research (ISCRR) conducted presentations of its latest research programs. Those projects included: The discussion on the management and...
View ArticleIs the OHS role in ESG overstated?
The March 2023 edition of Professional Safety, the journal of the American Society of Safety Professionals, included a lead story about the safety professional’s role in ESG (Environment Safety and...
View ArticleExcessive heat is another reason to redesign work
There seems little doubt that global warming is now a reality. It has been forecast since the 1970s at least, but the fact of creeping change needs a turning point, and it seems that the current...
View ArticleThe US take on heat and climate change
Coincidentally, as Europe burns and a little blog in Australia writes about the occupational context of excessive heat, a new book called Heat – Life and Death on a scorched planet was in the...
View ArticleWorking in Heat, and Gwarda
New research into working in excessive heat concisely summarises the socioeconomic impacts but misses the obvious strategies to prevent or diminish these impacts. It also includes impacts on...
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