WorkSafe – OH&S Regulations Discussion Paper
The CMPA had the opportunity to comment on the Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S) Regulations Discussion Paper, presented in the first SRG meeting in November 2025.
CMPA is a member of WorkSafe’s Mines, Quarries and Petroleum Stakeholder Reference Group (SRG), established to gather, understand and consider feedback during policy development of regulations and codes.
Submission
The CMPA does not support the incorporation of lower risk quarrying into Part 5.3 as suggested in the OHS Regulations Discussion Paper due to having a lower and different risk profile to mining and onshore petroleum sites.
Conclusion
There are also fundamental issues with the OHS Regulations 2017 that need to be addressed in the new OHS Regulations such as:
- The employer has no certainty in ever being fully compliant.
- No business will be fully compliant for 365 days in a year.
- Unsustainable level of documentation requirements.
- Sets up an adversarial relationship between the employer and employee.
- Managers spending more time processing paperwork than oversight of operations.
- Routine WorkSafe site visits are perceived as being adversarial with fear of persecution or retribution (Psychological health regulations).
Recommendations
- Promote a positive relationship between the employer and employee of working together to achieve a safe workplace.
- Create a culture where safety is embedded in the workplace.
- WorkSafe working together with industry for a safer workplace.
- WorkSafe active encouragement of employee training.
- Provide certainty in compliance.
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