THE RCSA (Recruitment and Consulting Services Association) has expressed its deep disappointment in reports that plans to reform New South Wales’s outdated occupational health and safety laws have been shelved.
Responding to reports published in the Australian newspaper, CEO of the RCSA, Ms Julie Mills, says the NSW government has a responsibility to address the unfair laws.
“NSW has the dubious distinction of being home to the worst OHS laws in the country, which puts an unfair burden on employers in all industries.
“For the recruitment and on-hire industry, they create an unacceptable and unsustainable level of risk for business owners, who can be prosecuted for incidents that are well and truly beyond their effective control, and despite their best efforts,” Mills said.
The laws currently place an absolute duty on employers to ‘ensure’ the health and safety of their workers, rather than requiring them to take steps that are ‘reasonably practicable’.
The effect is a legal framework that places employers at risk of prosecution even when they have acted responsibly.
The NSW Government is yet make public the findings of the Stein Review of the OHS Act, even though it was handed down in April last year.
Reports now indicate that the NSW Government will abandon the state’s OHS reform process altogether, in favour of focusing on national reform in consultation with the new Federal Labor Government.
“It’s simply not good enough to wait for a vague future goal of national reform. Employers in NSW need fair, workable laws today, not at some unspecified date down the track.
The RCSA calls on the NSW Industrial Relations Minister Della Bosca to come good on the promises he made to overhaul this outdated set of laws,” Mills said.