Under the OHS Act 2004 employers have a legal duty to provide and maintain a safe workplace and employees have the right to report any hazard or incident in the workplace. Reporting incidents or hazards aligns with your duty to contribute to a safe work environment as it informs what the employer knows or ought reasonably to know, and therefore the reasonably practicable steps they should be taking to provide a workplace that is safe and without risks to health.
Clear and accessible processes for reporting hazards in the workplace are essential to enable hazards to be identified and controlled in consultation with employees and their representatives. The Act requires that OHS reps and the employer representative attempt to resolve any OHS issues 'in accordance with the relevant agreed procedure or, if there is not such procedure, the relevant prescribed procedure' being the Issue Resolution Regulations and Resolution of issues - OHS Reps. Resolution of issues is covered under Part 7, Division 8 of the OHS Act, and at Part 2.2 of the OHS Regulations.
The issue resolution procedure in the Regulations sets the minimum requirements and is very clear about the process required for employees to report OHS issues – our guide Getting OHS Representation Right - A Guide for Workers includes a flowchart of the Regulations procedure. In fact, if an HSR is present in the DWG there is no requirement for employees to report to management at all!
The ‘agreed procedure’, if your workplace has one, must be developed by your employer in consultation with employees - either through their elected OHS Representative/s or, where there is no OHS Rep, then with the employees directly. Where there is an elected HSR, the consultation may also involve the workers. The agreed procedure must be consistent with the OHS Act – for example, it cannot include an agreement to remove the power of an HSR to issue a PIN or to exercise any other of their powers under the OHS Act or remove the right of DWG members to report hazards and safety issues to their HSR. If a procedure does not meet these criteria, it is not considered by WorkSafe to be an agreed procedure.
Should either the employer or a majority of employees have concerns about the adequacy of an ‘agreed procedure’, they are entitled to withdraw their agreement and, unless or until a new one is developed, the OHS Regulations will apply.
Your employer should also be asking themselves some questions if they believe that the HSR must take too much time away from their usual work to address safety concerns. The first question being “Why is my workplace so unsafe that the HSR is too busy for their work?” and the second “Do we have enough HSRs for the number of workers and the nature of the hazards they face?”
