Nita Green (Queensland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak in favour of the Albanese Labor government's Work Health and Safety Amendment Bill, and in doing so I might just quickly speak to some of what Senator Shoebridge was raising and the very real and urgent need to address engineered stone and the impact it's having on workers. I want to thank the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations for urging urgent reform on this and working with state and territory ministers to get that urgent reform. We know this is something that has been on the agenda for some time, and it's something that needs to be dealt with urgently. I look forward to seeing those reforms in place at a national level and across the country. I welcome the opportunity to speak on these important measures in the bill and congratulate the Minister for Employment and Workplace Relations as well as his state and territory counterparts for landing consensus on these measures. They might be modest reforms, but they are very meaningful reforms.

This bill harmonises the existing act with the model laws from Safe Work Australia's work in response to the Boland review. Many people may not have heard about what the Boland review is, but it's a really important piece of policy work. Ms Marie Boland conducted a review of Australia's model work health and safety laws in 2018. The Boland review made 34 recommendations on updates to model work health and safety laws, and I want to thank Ms Boland for her important work in this space. Since then, the recommendations of the review have been the subject of tripartite collaboration between the Commonwealth and the states and territories, as well as employers and unions. These groups have been meeting to examine the recommendations and build consensus on the model work health and safety laws. This bill is the first step in the Albanese Labor government's work health and safety reforms.

So what will change because of this bill? As I said at the top of my remarks, these modest but meaningful reforms have the potential to make important impacts on the prevention of workplace accidents. This bill strengthens the government's national approach to managing work health and safety, delivering more consistency across jurisdictions and improving information sharing between key organisations.

Importantly, this bill clarifies that health and safety representatives—or HSRs, as they're commonly referred to in the workplace—who are elected by their workmates can choose a course of training and more effectively issue improvement notices. HSRs are elected by their workmates to do the important work of maintaining and advocating safe systems of work and the elimination of hazards. It would seem straightforward that an HSR should be able to select a training course best suited to them and their workmates to ensure they are prepared and supported in the work they do, but not all employers have respected that principle.

A few years ago, at a train maintenance depot in Sydney, two HSRs went to their boss and put in their paperwork for a health and safety course of their choosing which suited their needs and those of their workmates. They were told by their management that they weren't able to attend their chosen training and that management would choose where they would go. Those HSRs fought this direction all the way to the state Industrial Relations Commission, and they won. That precedent informs the clarification that we see now in this suite of measures. I want to congratulate those particular HSRs and their workmates, who backed them every step of the way. I also want to acknowledge the members and staff of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, who got behind those HSRs and made that win possible. Because of their support, that win is now becoming national law. We know that health and safety representatives are trusted leaders and play a vital role in keeping workplaces safe. This is why we are updating the laws to make their jobs easier and simpler.

Our government's work health and safety amendment also closes a loophole that some unscrupulous employers have used to avoid accountability for poor safety performance. Currently, employers can purchase insurance for work health and safety fines, which is extraordinary when you think about it. Imagine if an ordinary person could take out an insurance policy against getting parking fines. You would imagine that the compulsion to act in a way that avoids punishment would be seriously diminished, and that is exactly what has happened in workplaces. That's what this loophole means for some employers: the potential punishment and spirit of the penalties are neutralised. Our changes mean that employers doing the wrong thing can't avoid taking financial responsibility for unsafe work environments. Our changes prohibit insurance for work health and safety fines.

Importantly, the bill also guarantees stronger consequences and penalties for employers who expose workers to serious and fatal risks. The bill strengthens the ability to take action against employers who have recklessly caused fatal injury to a worker. It updates what are called category 1 offences, the most serious category of prosecution in relation to injuries to a worker, to now include negligence, which has a more realistic prospect of prosecution. Previously, category 1 only listed offences on the basis of recklessness leading to the death of a worker, which has never been used, because of the unrealistic threshold for prosecution. This sounds like a very small, technical, legal change, but my hope is that it is a first step to more prosecutions in cases were there has been the death of a worker that could have been prevented.

Too many workers are killed in preventable workplace accidents. Last year 169 workers lost their lives. They went to work and they never came home. Just over two weeks ago in North Queensland two workers lost their lives. Dylan Langridge was 33 years old and Trevor Davis was aged 36. They had long lives ahead of them. They died in North Queensland in a mine when they were trapped underground. They went to work and they should have come home. I want to be really clear about this because this is incredibly important. The only acceptable number of workplace deaths is zero. Every single worker has the right to come home at the end of their shift just as safe and healthy as when they left for work. Our government not only believes that but today is legislating to make that so. That's because Labor is on the side of working people.

We believe that workers should be safe, respected and fairly paid. These changes start our work in improving workers' safety. The previous government had had this report since 2018. Until now not a single recommendation had been implemented by the Commonwealth. These are modest and mostly technical changes but they demonstrate our government's commitment to safety and respect at work and they paint a stark contrast with the previous government.

This is just the beginning of our government's reforms on health, safety and respect at work. The tripartite body that made these recommendations has continued their work looking at future reforms. I understand that the next tranche of reforms will continue to strengthen protections for workers from serious and fatal injuries due to negligence and recklessness. This is what's needed to keep workers safe.

I also want to acknowledge the important work being done alongside union members and our state counterparts to take long overdue action against hazards, including silicosis. This is incredibly important work that has gone silent for too long and must be fixed. Our government is also working through industrial relations changes which have a direct correlation with better health and safety. If you want a safe workplace, if you support workers coming home at the end of the day, then you should support Same Job, Same Pay laws. Because we know that when workers have the same job and the same pay, when they are treated with dignity and respect and they are given the power to speak up about safety, they come home safe at the end of the day.

I commend these changes to the chamber. I urge the Senate to support them. I thank the Senate.