Department of Justice and Community Safety

HEALTH AND SAFETY REPRESENTATIVES

The Occupational Health and Safety Act 1989 (the Act) encourages employers and employees to resolve occupational health and safety issues through consultation at the workplace.

Employers must provide adequate mechanisms to enable effective co-operation and consultation between employers and employees. The selection of a Health and Safety Representative (HSR) significantly aids the consultation process.

See: Information Bulletin 02.06 - Health and Safety Representatives for information.

Contact details for accredited HSR training course providers are available in Information Bulletin 02.08 - Approved Health and Safety Representative Training Providers.

Do I need to have a Health and Safety Representative?

The selection of a Health and Safety Representative (HSR) significantly aids the consultation process. Employers have a responsibility to facilitate the selection of a HSR and a Deputy HSR once a Designated Work Group has been established. This process must be a fair and equitable one.

Do I have to provide training for the Health and Safety Reps?

The Act also provides for Training of HSRs in their role. Training courses and providers are accredited by the ACT Occupational Health and Safety Council in accordance with Guidelines issued by the Council. See Guidelines for the approval of Health and Safety Representative Training Programs for information.

Contact details for accredited HSR training course providers are available in Information Bulletin 02.08 - Approved Health and Safety Representative Training Providers.

If a HSR requests training, it is an offence not to allow them access to accredited training. Employers may provide other beneficial health and safety training but HSRs and DHSRs have a legal right to accredited training.

The Act, sections 61(1)(ea) and 66(4), outline obligations of employers to enable Health and Safety Representatives and Deputies “to take such time off work, without loss of remuneration or other entitlements, as is necessary and reasonable to allow him or her to undertake a training program approved under the regulations”.

For ACT government employees the Act is modified by Schedule 3 – Public Sector Management Act 1994 and states: A health and safety representative for a designated work group shall undertake a course of training relating to occupational health and safety that is approved under the regulations.

PINS

What is a Provisional Improvement Notice (PIN)?

If a Health and Safety Representative (HSR) under the Act Section 67(1) believes on reasonable grounds that the Act or regulations are being breached, the representative must take all reasonably practicable steps to consult with the responsible person to attempt to resolve the problem, Section 67(2) before issuing a Provisional Improvement Notice (PIN).

If the problem cannot be resolved by consultation within a reasonable period of time, the matter may, for example, be referred to the relevant health and safety committee, if one has been established in the organisation. The health and safety committee may discuss and recommend a course of action to the employer, based on their collective knowledge of the hazard and working environment.

If the Health and Safety Representative considers that the issue has not been satisfactorily resolved by the consultative process, the representative may issue a PIN to the person breaching or likely to breach the Act and/or the Regulations (Section 67).

The PIN must specify the contravention of the Act that the health and safety representative believes is occurring or is likely to occur, and set out the reasons for that belief .

The PIN shall specify a reasonable period not less than 7 days by which the problem is to be resolved (Section (67)(4)). In the case of the construction industry the PIN may be issued for a compliance period within 24 hours (Section 67(5)).

PIN’s are only issued by the Health and Safety Representative. It is not to be confused with other regulatory notices issued by ACT WorkCover Inspectors, such as Prohibition Notices, Improvement Notices and Infringement Notices.

OHS Rep Accreditation

Where can I get information about getting accredited as a training provider for OHS representatives?

For further information on accreditation click here.

Workcover