CASE STUDY

A global fertiliser listed company operating multiple Major Hazard Facilities in Australia (‘the company’)

We reviewed the operation of the company’s established workplace health and safety management system (WH&SMS) at four Major Hazard Facilities (MHF) where workers and neighbours were at risk to release of toxic gases and or hazardous chemicals. Key elements assessed were:

• Training programs and on-going communication of risks and hazards.
• Processes to report and manage WH&S hazards, near-misses incidents and corrective actions including the IT platform.
• Processes to ensure key elements of the WH&SMS and commitments per the submitted Safety Cases were operating and deficiencies were appropriately escalated to Executives and the Board.

We conducted site inspections and interviews with over 20 MHF site personnel (including chemical and electrical engineers) and performed sample testing of records (i.e. chemical process safety information). The company benefited from our team’s ability to understand its complex operating environment and the critical questions we posed.

We identified and highlighted several significant recommendations that needed to be addressed in both the short term and long term to ensure the company meet its legislative obligations and its stakeholders’ expectations.

CASE STUDY

Regulator with staff working in remote locations facing variety of hazards (‘the Regulator’)

In this engagement, we considered the implementation status of actions resulting from a prior internal WH&S review.

We also added further insight into the WH&S culture and made recommendations to improve the health, safety and wellbeing of the Regulator’s workers. This included changes to align and improve work practices across the Regulator, including:

• Organisational communication
• Induction
• Vehicle procurement
• Scheduling and field visits

CASE STUDY

Major metropolitan hospital (‘the hospital’)

We considered the operation of the hospital’s workplace health and safety management system (WH&SMS) where workers faced the risk of occupational violence, manual handling and vaccine preventable diseases in providing patient care. The review considered key elements including:

• Training programs to efficiently and effectively communicate to workers on how to identify, assess and manage hazards, in particular manual handling and occupational violence
• Processes to practically report and manage hazards, near-misses incidents and correct actions to manage safety risks in the context of a patient-focused environment
• Inspection program to ensure safeguards implemented were in place and effective

We interviewed a variety of hospital staff and viewed key records to validate key processes at the hospital were effective. The hospital benefited from our team’s ability to appreciate its patient outcome focus environment and hence our practical recommendations.

We identified and highlighted some significant recommendations to ensure the hospital meet its legislative obligations, keep its workers health and safe and not compromise patient care, including:

• Improvements to its WH&S hazard, near-miss and incident reporting process and IT platform; and
• Roles and accountabilities for managing asbestos and workers’ immunisation program