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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 13 Hansard (26 November) . . Page.. 4644 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

2003 ACT OH&S awards and also recognise that they do have an important role in improving the standards of workplace safety in the ACT.

I would also like to recognise that ACT WorkCover inspectors have a critical role in developing compliance with OH&S legislation within workplaces, including construction sites, offices and industrial sites. They provide support, information and advice on workplace health and safety and they also have a critical role in investigating employee complaints, workplace incidents and other dangerous incidents. I have consistently heard from contacts that the work of the inspectors is valuable and critical. However, I understand that the improvement in compliance with the legislation would be significant with the increase of a few more inspectors.

I have therefore circulated an amendment to Ms MacDonald's motion to call on the government to seriously consider increasing the number of inspectors in ACT WorkCover to improve compliance with the relative legislation. Basically my amendment asks the government to investigate increasing the number of inspectors employed by ACT WorkCover to ensure greater compliance with the relevant legislation in the ACT and to improve effective communication of the legislation to the ACT stakeholders and to report back to the Assembly on this investigation.

My concern about inspectors is not about questioning their competence-more that there are not enough of them to spend time at sites to develop more awareness around workplace safety. It is a shame to have these inspectors doing important work to improve workplace health and safety and yet be understaffed and underresourced.

I move:

Insert

(4) calls on the Government

to investigate increasing the number of inspectors employed by ACT Workcover to ensure greater compliance with the relevant legislation in the ACT and to improve effective communication of the legislation to the ACT stakeholders; and

(b) to report back to the Assembly on this investigation.".

I have just spoken to that amendment.

The legislation that ACT WorkCover administers is reasonably comprehensive, and there has been an active review over the years. But the legislation is only as good as enforcement and compliance, and this requires resources and attention. We can go down the self-compliance path, but the evidence simply is not there to convince me that this is an effective way to improve compliance. So the other option is to increase education and awareness of OH&S by increasing the time that inspectors spend in workplaces.

Last week we talked about casualisation of the workforce. Another consequence of increased casual staff in workplaces is difficulty in maintaining and learning about safe workplace practices.

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