World Day for Safety and Health at Work - 28 April 2021

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Published
22nd March 2021

Author: David Royston-Jennings, Regional Risk Coordinator, LGMS

The annual World Day for Safety and Health at Work promotes the prevention of occupational accidents and diseases globally. It is an awareness campaign focusing international attention on the magnitude of work-related deaths and injuries and the importance of reducing this through the creation and fostering of a strong health and safety culture.

Closer to home, Work Health and Safety Queensland's (part of the Office of Industrial Relations) purpose is to improve work health and safety and reduce the risk of work-related fatalities, injuries and diseases and is responsible for regulating Workplace Health and Safety  (WH&S) across Queensland. 

Local governments have a duty of care to mitigate risk to their workers, contractors, volunteers and members of the public for two reasons:

          1.    Managing and reducing risks prevents incidents before they happen, protecting workers’ safety and productivity.
          2.    Taking steps to manage risks is a condition of doing business in Queensland. If an incident occurs, the regulator will need to see evidence of an effective risk management process in place.

Councils across the state provide a broad range of services and activities for their communities, some of which may potentially impact the physical or mental health and wellbeing of local government workers. 

Since 1998, LGW Workcare has provided workers’ compensation cover to Local Government entities in Queensland. LGW provides protection beyond insurance, with a range of value added services to enable local government entities to effectively manage workers’ compensation claims, limit their exposure, manage costs through best practice claims, injury management, injury prevention and WH&S strategies. 

Over the last 23 years, the average LGW council contribution has reduced from 3.64% being charged by WorkCover to 1.30% of payroll in the LGW scheme today. Consistent savings demonstrate the importance of maintaining the existing self-insurance arrangements for councils. More recently, LGW has increased its focus on WH&S through the development and implementation of a WH&S Strategy and a number of other initiatives for councils. LGW shares Queensland councils’ vision of creating and facilitating an integrated, organisational-wide approach to safety that produces a more engaged workforce, increases productivity and work participation, enhances resilience and ensures employees physical and mental health and wellbeing.  LGW is also striving to support councils on their mission of improving WH&S practices and processes.

Additionally, in October 2020, LGW member councils were advised of changes approved by the LGW Management Committee to further strengthen the scheme through the introduction of an LGW Mutual Risk Obligations Program - that commenced in January 2021. The intention of this program is to ensure that members fully comply with their legislative obligations and maintain a compliant and effective safety management system, which it aims to do by requiring that all members adhere to the following five mutual risk obligations as a commitment of their LGW Membership:

Obligation 1
To manage, prioritise and resource workplace health and safety within their organisation in accordance with legislative requirements and community expectations.

Obligation 2
To facilitate an audit to be undertaken by an accredited auditor approved by the Office of Industrial Relations against self-insurers requirements at least every four years (to be scheduled in collaboration with LGW).

Obligation 3
To develop in collaboration with the LGW safety team a Workplace Health and Safety Management System Plan signed by the Chief Executive Officer identifying key strategies to mitigate risk, e.g. effective implementation and measurement of council’s safety management system. Progress is to be reviewed annually in collaboration with LGW.

Obligation 4
To monitor and track their organisation’s WH&S performance at the management and executive level and provide the following reports to LGW on an annual basis: 

  • Audit action plan (resulting from mutual tisk obligation 2 above).
  • Progress or performance report (e.g. measurement of objectives, trends, WH&S KPIs, system failures and audit action closures).
  • Notifiable incidents and subsequent investigation reports (where applicable).

Obligation 5
Complete an annual self-assessment surveillance audit covering key risk areas identified and selected by the LGW safety team in collaboration with the LGW Management Committee.

For more information regarding the LGW Mutual Risk Obligations Program, please contact your LGW WHS Consultant or Divisional Manager, Dean Campbell.