Is your small business OHS and WHS compliant?
Do you think your business is meeting its OHS/WHS obligations and if so, what are you spending in dollar terms per annum to meet these obligations?
Are you confident that you are covered in the event of an accident or incident, or a Worksafe investigation?
What is Workplace health and safety (WHS)?
Workplace Health and Safety (WHS), often referred to as Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S) involves the assessment and migration of risks that may impact the health, safety or welfare of those in your workplace. This may include the health and safety of your customers, employees, visitors, contractors, volunteers and suppliers. As a business owner there are legal requirements that you must comply with to ensure your workplace meets WHS obligations.
Benefits of WHS in your business
Creating a safe work environment is a legal requirement and critical to the long term success of your business. It can:
help you retain staffmaximise employee productivityminimise injury and illness in the workplacereduce the costs of injury and workers’ compensationensure you meet your legal obligations and employee responsibilities.WHS obligations for business
As a business owner you have legal responsibilities to implement health and safety practices in your workplace as soon as you start your business. You need to ensure that your business doesn't create health and safety problems for your employees, contractors, volunteers, visitors, customers or the public.
Knowing and understanding WHS laws and how they apply to business will help you avoid unnecessary costs and damage to your business caused by workplace injury and illness.
Under Australian WHS/OH&S legislation businesses are legally obliged to:
provide safe work premisesassess risks and implement appropriate measures for controlling themensure safe use and handling of goods and substancesprovide and maintain safe machinery and materialsassess workplace layout and provide safe systems of workprovide a suitable working environment and facilitieshave insurance and workers compensation workers’ compensation insurance for your employees.
