• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Safety Risk .net

Humanising Safety and Embracing Real Risk

  • Home
    • About
      • Privacy Policy
      • Contact
  • FREE RESOURCES
    • FREE SAFETY eBOOKS
    • FREE DOWNLOADS
    • TOP 50
    • FREE RISK ASSESSMENT FORMS
    • Find a Safety Consultant
    • Free Safety Program Documents
    • Psychology Of Safety
    • Safety Ideas That Work
    • HEALTH and SAFETY MANUALS
    • FREE SAFE WORK METHOD STATEMENT RESOURCES
    • Whats New In Safety
    • FUN SAFETY STUFF
    • Health and Safety Training
    • SAFETY COURSES
    • Safety Training Needs Analysis and Matrix
    • Top 20 Safety Books
    • This Toaster Is Hot
    • Free Covid-19 Toolbox Talks
    • Download Page – Please Be Patient With Larger Files…….
    • SAFETY IMAGES, Photos, Unsafe Pictures and Funny Fails
    • How to Calculate TRIFR, LTIFR and Other Health and Safety Indicators
    • Download Safety Moments from Human Resources Secretariat
  • PSYCHOLOGY OF SAFETY & RISK
    • Safety Psychology Terminology
    • Some Basics on Social Psychology & Risk
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk – Prof Karl E. Weick
    • The Psychology of Leadership in Risk
    • Conducting a Psychology and Culture Safety Walk
    • The Psychology of Conversion – 20 Tips to get Started
    • Understanding The Social Psychology of Risk And Safety
    • Psychology and safety
    • The Psychology of Safety
    • Hot Toaster
    • TALKING RISK VIDEOS
    • WHAT IS SAFETY
    • THE HOT TOASTER
    • THE ZERO HARM DEBATE
    • SEMIOTICS
    • LEADERSHIP
  • Covid-19
    • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
    • Covid-19 Returning to Work Inductions, Transitioning, Safety Start Up and Re Entry Plans
    • Covid-19 Work from Home Safety Checklists and Risk Assessments
    • The Hierarchy of Control and Covid-19
    • Why Safety Loves Covid-19
    • Covid-19, Cricket and Lessons in Safety
    • The Covid-19 Lesson
    • Safety has this Covid-19 thing sorted
    • The Heart of Wisdom at Covid Time
    • How’s the Hot Desking Going Covid?
    • The Semiotics of COVID-19 and the Social Amplification of Risk
    • Working From Home Health and Safety Tips – Covid-19
    • Covid-19 and the Hierarchy of Control
  • Dr Rob Long Posts
    • Learning Styles Matter
    • There is no HIERARCHY of Controls
    • Scaffolding, Readiness and ZPD in Learning
    • What Can Safety Learn From Playschool?
    • Presentation Tips for Safety People
    • Dialogue Do’s and Don’ts
    • It’s Only a Symbol
    • Ten Cautions About Safety Checklists
    • Zero is Unethical
    • First Report on Zero Survey
    • There is No Objectivity, Deal With it!
  • Quotes & Slogans
    • Researchers Reveal the Top 10 Most Effective Safety Slogans Of All Time
    • When Slogans Don’t Work
    • 77 OF THE MOST CLASSIC, FAMOUS and INFAMOUS SAFETY QUOTES
    • 500 BEST and WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2021
    • 167 CATCHY and FUNNY SAFETY SLOGANS FOR THE WORKPLACE
    • COVID-19 (Coronavirus, Omicron) Health and Safety Slogans and Quotes for the Workplace
    • Safety Acronyms
    • You know Where You Can Stick Your Safety Slogans
    • Sayings, Slogans, Aphorisms and the Discourse of Simple
    • Spanish Safety Slogans – Consignas de seguridad
    • Safety Slogans List
    • Road Safety Slogans
    • How to write your own safety slogans
    • Why Are Safety Slogans Important
    • Safety Slogans Don’t Save Lives
    • 40 Free Safety Slogans For the Workplace
    • Safety Slogans for Work
You are here: Home / Safety systems / The Safety Paperwork Myth

The Safety Paperwork Myth

May 4, 2016 by Admin 5 Comments

imageGreat article by Health and Safety Lawyer Greg Smith recent published here on his blog: My Safety Thoughts. Look out for Greg’s new book, co-authored with Dr Rob Long (due out in June): “Risky Conversations, The Law, Social Psychology and Risk” – I’ve had a sneak preview and it is an absolute cracker!

An adequate system of work – And no SWMS required

by Greg Smith

In a recent NSW decision, Safe Work NSW v Wollongong Glass P/L [2016] NSWDC 58, the New South Wales District Court has again looked at the issue of an employer’s liability under occupational safety and health legislation where no written system of work exists.

This is a topic that I have discussed in previous posts which you can access here.

The facts as described in the case were:

[2]  At about 2.30pm on 6 March 2013 at the defendant’s premises (the factory), the deceased was assisting another employee Mr Pham to lean a number of glass sheets stacked on an A-frame trolley forward to allow Mr Pham to remove one of the sheets stored behind them. The glass sheets were 2306mm high by 2100mm wide and weighed approximately 80kg each. The procedure adopted by the deceased and Mr Pham was for Mr Pham to lean the sheets towards the deceased and for the deceased to support them with his hands. It was intended that when Mr Pham could access the required sheet, that he would attach a pinch grab to it and remove it to another A-frame trolley by the use of an overhead travelling crane (the crane). The weight of the glass sheets became too much for the deceased to support and they fell causing him fatal head injuries.
[3] At the time the deceased was under the influence of cannabis to the extent that in the opinion of Dr Judith Perl, a consultant pharmacologist, the deceased’s perceptions, judgement, decision making processes, vigilance, appreciation of dangers, concentration and reaction times were significantly impaired.

While it It was common ground that the defendant a “system of work” at the date of the incident, it was not “reduced to writing“. It was implemented through verbal direction and on the job training, enforced by supervision.

The prosecution argued that the:

“... system of work was inadequate [and] described the …system of work as “informal”, “ad hoc” and involving the exercise of a worker’s discretion, based on their experience, to determine how to move a piece of glass.” (paragraph [66]).

As often happens in these cases, the prosecution alleged that there were a range of reasonably practicable steps that the employer could have taken, and that these reasonably practicable steps were proven because they were methods adopted by the employer after the accident in a Safe Work Method Statement.

Ultimately, the Court accepted that the employer’s system of work was sufficient, notwithstanding that it was not a written system. The Court found that the system of work provided adequate training, including the use of a buddy system, that was enforced by supervision.

Moreover, the Court expressly found that:

It was not reasonably practicable for the defendant to provide the training required by sub-paragraphs 6(a) and 6(d) in a written SWMS … (paragraph [95]).

The Court observed, firstly that a SWMS was only required for high risk construction work, which did not apply in this case and further, a SWMS is not evidence the workers had been trained in the content of the document nor that they would comply with it.

While I think that there are elements of the case that may be open to challenge if it was appealed, it is consistent with a number of cases that challenge the credibility of documented safety management systems, or at least their application in practice.

The lessons from all of these cases is that the primary duty of an employer is to ensure, as far as it can, that it’s workers understand the risks associated with the work they undertake, and work in accordance with the controls that have been implemented to manage those risks. To the extent that this can be demonstrated:

“Where an employer is found to have laid down a safe and proper practice and there is no evidence that the employer failed to use due diligence to see that the practice is observed, then a casual failure by inferior employees, even if of supervisory rank, to observe that practice on a particular occasion will not render the employer criminally liable for a failure to ensure safety” (paragraph [32]).

Whether those risks and the measures to control them are evidenced by documented systems is neither here nor there. Indeed, one of the common failings of safety management systems is our tendency to document the system but then never apply any effective assurance, much less adequate due diligence, to confirm that the system is implemented and effective in practice.

Ultimately, it will be the evidence of the workers and their description of how they perform the work, both at the time of the incident and historically, that will determine the extent to which an employer has implemented an effective system.

Documented processes for managing health and safety risks at work are of course important. In some cases they are a strict legal requirement. However, if you have documented systems that describe how work ought to be performed you need to be continually asking the question, how do I know the work is actually being performed in accordance with that system?

For what it is worth, the number of incidents or injuries that you have in a workplace is not a measure of whether work is being performed in accordance with your documented systems.

Please share our posts

  • Click to print (Opens in new window)
  • Click to email this to a friend (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on LinkedIn (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Safety systems Tagged With: paperwork, swms

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Search and Discover More on this Site

Visit Count – Started Jan 2015

  • 23,920,471 Visitors

Never miss a post - Subscribe via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,406 other subscribers

NEW! Free Download

How we pay for the high cost of running of this site – try it for free on your site

Please take our 2 minute zero survey

Recent Comments

  • Admin on 500 BEST and WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2021
  • Rob Long on Holistic Responses to Mental Health
  • Steve Nevin on Holistic Responses to Mental Health
  • Raven on 500 BEST and WORST WORKPLACE HEALTH and SAFETY SLOGANS 2021
  • Rob Long on Understanding Real Risk
  • Musa SULEIMAN on Understanding Real Risk
  • Brian Darlington on Social Psychology Of Risk Workshops
  • Matt Thorne on Social Psychology Of Risk Workshops
  • Rob Long on Is Safety A Virtue Signal?
  • John Davey on Is Safety A Virtue Signal?

FREE eBOOK DOWNLOADS

Featured Downloads

  • OHS-Policies-and-Procedures-Manual.doc (7669 downloads)
  • Guidance-FOR-the-beginning-OHS-professiona1.docx (22497 downloads)
  • Guidance-FOR-the-beginning-OHS-professiona1.docx (1684 downloads)
  • Safe Work Method Statement ACT (5562 downloads)
  • National-Emergency-Risk-Assessment-Guidelines.pdf (2536 downloads)
  • Presentation-Skills-Toolbox.pdf (1123 downloads)
  • Manual-Handling-Checklist.doc (6496 downloads)
  • Draft Culture Standard for Construction (249 downloads)
  • Field Activity Risk Assessment Form (2005 downloads)
  • Event Risk Management (1448 downloads)
  • Public-Event-Risk-Management-Checklist-HD.doc (1913 downloads)
  • Due-Diligence-Workshop-Nov-2018.pdf (747 downloads)
  • UV_Risk_Assessment_Checklist-1.doc (2269 downloads)
  • Following-Leading-in-Risk-SECTION-1.pdf (2007 downloads)
  • Health and Safety Risk Assessment Checklist (10617 downloads)

Recent Posts

  • Holistic Responses to Mental Health
  • Linguistics, Language and Meaning in Risk
  • Social Psychology Of Risk Workshops
  • Is Safety A Virtue Signal?
  • Being Emotional and Being Safe
  • CLLR–Quarterly Newsletter–April 2022
  • Understanding Real Risk
  • Understanding Humans and How They Tackle Risk
  • How to Know if Safety ‘Works’
  • Programming for Safety, the Performance Myth

What is Psychological Safety at Work?

Footer

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,406 other subscribers

AUTHORS

  • Alan Quilley
    • Heinrich–Industrial Accident Prevention
    • The Problem With ZERO Goals and Results
  • Bernard Corden
    • After the goldrush
    • The Internationale
  • Bill Sims
    • Employee Engagement: Chocolate, Vanilla, or Strawberry?
    • Injury Hiding-How do you stop it?
  • Craig Clancy
    • Task Based vs Activity Based Safe Work Method Statements
    • Safety And Tender Submissions
  • Daniel Kirk
    • It’s easy being wise after the event.
    • A Positive Safety Story
  • Dave Whitefield
    • Safety is about…
    • Safety and Compliance
  • Dennis Millard
    • Are You Risk Intelligent?
    • Honey they get me! They get me at work!
  • Drewie
    • Downturn Doin’ Your Head In? Let’s Chat….
    • How was your break?
  • Gabrielle Carlton
    • All Care and No Care!
    • You Are Not Alone!
  • George Robotham
    • How to Give an Unforgettable Safety Presentation
    • How To Write a Safety Report
  • Goran Prvulovic
    • Safety Manager – an Ultimate Scapegoat
    • HSE Performance – Back to Basics
  • James Ellis
    • Psychological Core Stability for Wellbeing in Workers Comp
    • In search of plan B in workers’ recovery
  • James Parkinson
    • To laugh or not to laugh
    • People and Safety
  • John Toomey
    • In it for The Long Haul – Making the most of the FIFO Lifestyle
    • Who is Responsible for This?
  • Karl Cameron
    • Abby Normal Safety
    • The Right Thing
  • Ken Roberts
    • Safety Legislation Is Our Biggest Accident?
    • HSE Trip Down Memory Lane
  • Mark Perrett
    • Psychology of Persuasion: Top 5 influencing skills for getting what you want
  • Mark Taylor
    • Build a Psychologically Safe Workplace by Taking Risks and Analysing Failures
    • Enculturing Safety
  • Max Geyer
    • WHS Legislation is NOT about Safety it’s about Culture
    • Due Diligence Is Not Just Ticking Boxes!
  • Matt Thorne
    • Safety Culture–Hudson’s Model
    • Culture – Edgar Schein
  • Peter Ribbe
    • Is there “Common Sense” in safety?
    • Who wants to be a safety professional?
  • Phil LaDuke
    • Professional Conferences Are A Sleazy Con
    • Hey Idiots, You’re Worried About the Wrong Things
  • Admin
    • Social Psychology Of Risk Workshops
    • CLLR–Quarterly Newsletter–April 2022
  • Dr Rob Long
    • Holistic Responses to Mental Health
    • Linguistics, Language and Meaning in Risk
  • Rob Sams
    • The Learning (and unlearning) that Revealed my Vocation
    • I’m just not that into safety anymore
  • Barry Spud
    • Things To Consider When Developing And Designing Your Company SWMS
    • Bad Safety Photos
  • Sheri Suckling
    • How Can I Get the Boss to Listen?
  • Simon Cassin
    • Safety values, ideas, behaviours and clothes
  • Safety Nerd
    • The Block isn’t portraying safety as it should be
    • Toolbox Talk Show–PPE
  • Wynand Serfontein
    • Why The Problem With Learning Is Unlearning
    • I DON’T KNOW
  • Zoe Koskinas
    • Why is fallibility so challenging in the workplace?

Most commented on

Forecasting Safety

The Banned Objects Index – A New Development in Safety Culture

The Unconscious and the Soap Dispenser

Dumbs for Safety

The Real Barriers to Safety

Safety as Faith Healing

Who Said We Don’t Need Systems?

Why Safety Controls Don’t Always Work

How to use signs, symbols and text effectively in communicating about risk

Safety Should NOT Be About Safety

FEATURED POSTS

Transdisciplinarity and Worldviews in Risk

Concept Mapping Risk iCue

I am a Spreadsheet King

The Less You See, the More Likely to Die

How does collective mindfulness apply to workers compensation?

A Great Comparison of Risk and Safety Schools of Thought

The Will To Be and Do

Does Safety Have A Soul?

The Essentialist Pleasure Of Safety

Risk, Safety and Fundamental Attribution Error

Safety Gives Me the Right over Other Rights

In Praise of In-Between Thinking in Risk and Safety

Free Poster–What is Safety

Meeting is NOT About Technique

Social Psychology of Risk in Canada

Safety and Risk Leadership Master Class

The Dance of Death and Randomness

Risk You Can Eat

Third Group Commences the Graduate Program in The Psychology of Risk

Emotions are not the Adversary

More Posts from this Category

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address and join other discerning risk and safety people who receive notifications of new posts by email

Join 7,406 other subscribers

How we pay for the high cost of running of this site – try it for free on your site

 

How To Make Your Own Hand Sanitizer

 

 

How to Make your own Covid-19 Face Mask

 

Covid-19 Returning To Work Safety, Transitioning, Start Up And Re Entry Plans

 

How’s the Hot Desking Going Covid?

imageOne of the benefits of the Covid-19 epidemic is a total rethink about how we live and work (https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-03-28/coronavirus-could-reshape-how-australians-work-forever/12097124 ).

Expertise by Regurgitation and Re-Badging

One of the fascinating things about the Coronavirus pandemic is watching Safety morph into epidemiology expertise. I would like a dollar for every flyer, presentation, podcast, powerpoint, checklist template, toolbox talk and poster set that had jumped into my inbox… Read the rest

The Stress of Stasis

One of the challenging things about the Coronavirus crisis is stasis. For those without work and confined to home, for those in self-isolation, it’s like life is frozen in time. ‘Stay at home’ is the mantra. The trouble is, in… Read the rest

loading Cancel
Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
Email check failed, please try again
Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.