Commercial Property & Worksafe
As a commercial property manager, your responsibilities vary depending on the client’s needs. For most, the role includes managing the property’s repairs & maintenance, renovations, new fitouts, etc.
In this capacity, it is hard to argue against that you have a lot of control and influence – two words that weigh heavily on your duties under the health & safety legislation.
Previous posts we have done have covered your duty over the contractors you use and ways this can be managed. This post focuses on Worksafe Notifications. What are they? What is the impact? What are my rights?
With the exception of some kind of accident, Worksafe tends to let you know if they are doing a site visit. We suggest treating this as a positive exercise as the Inspectors are typically quite helpful. The exact day and time of the visit has to suit you so you can be selfish about that. Note that the Inspector can come in at any time so we do suggest taking a positive approach to this.
There is no specific need to do any preparation i.e. major clean up, having ‘certain’ team members away for the day, that sort of thing. If you feel you do need to do things, then that is probably a good indication you may want to focus on your H&S a bit more. We do get that having a Worksafe Inspector turn up is a good boot up the bum to get a few of those chores completed, you know, the type that you are going to do on a rainy day. Fix that guard, throw out the rubbish, tidy up this or that.
We do tell our clients that ‘wet paint sticks out’. If you start making lots of changes just for the Inspector’s arrival, it often stands out and can be quite obvious. Treat it for what it is, a positive learning process.
There are four potential outcomes from the visit. .
Nothing – the Inspector is happy with what you are doing
Directive Letter – an informal letter highlighting an area that may not meet legislation but is not bad enough for an Improvement Notice. Although not a legal enforcement tool, Worksafe is now requiring Inspectors to close these out.
Improvement Notice – formal timebound request to fix a particular issue that does not meet legislation. It will be clearly stated what the failing is and what needs to be done to fix it. Typically you get allocated 4 weeks to sort although you can discuss this with the Inspector.
Close Down – the Inspector can close down the immediate activity, area, business and make you fix whatever the issue is before you can continue.