workplace health and safety

If it’s not already happening, Board room agendas will be making room for yet another compliance program.

We’ve said it before and it’s worth repeating: the bolstering of anti-sexual harassment laws will see workplaces adopt approaches akin to eliminating or minimising, so far as reasonably practicable, workplace health and safety risk. The positive duty demands

We have psychosocial risks, of which sexual harassment is one of the most common hazards. We have a new positive duty to prevent sexual harassment at a federal level that we discussed in our previous blog. The duties are at least similar: “So far as is reasonably practicable’’ under health and safety law and

Employee burnout is high, with one recent survey reporting that one in three participants say they experienced this in the last 12 months. This can lead to disengagement, high staff turnover and claims connected with mental illness or injuries.

To mark the fact that today is World Day for Health and Safety at Work, we

During the Australian summer, media reports have documented a tragic spike in drownings at unpatrolled Australian beaches, as people search for remote swimming spots they might not normally use during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. Millions of swimming lessons – a rite of passage to a core element of Australian life — have also been missed

Some time ago, we queried whether punitive enforcement action against duty holders was the best approach for improving health and safety outcomes for Australian workers.

Since then, Australian Parliaments have been busy creating yet more offences for the statute books, that carry even more serious penalties. Industrial manslaughter is just one example. Cynics might interpret

Our clients care deeply about innovation and technology. We know this from our engagement with clients including discussions triggered by reflecting on the findings of the CSIRO’s Workplace Safety Futures report.

Our clients care about “machines” (including “robots”, artificial intelligence, biometrics and the harnessing of big data) being developed as a result of innovation and

On 12 December 2013 Seyfarth Shaw announced our Australian offices were officially open for business. Today marks five years since those doors opened.

What better way to reflect than to ask ourselves, what have been the biggest changes in our specialist areas of law over those five years?

“It has become increasingly difficult to make

Allegations of sexual harassment have dominated headlines, most visibly with the #MeToo campaign.

Sexual harassment complaints, and the laws that attempt to curb the behaviours, are not new. Despite regulation, sexual harassment is still occurring in workplaces. Why?

One answer may be that organisations guard against sexual harassment through policy and lecture style training without