Vulnerability of Maintenance Personnel

On 18 March, Briony Rowley attended a WorkSafe Victoria MRISC Workshop focusing on plant safety with regards to working safely with machinery and equipment. The Workshop outlined the hazards and risks posed to those in the workforce who undertake MRISC (maintenance, repair, installation, servicing and cleaning) tasks.

It is a failure in the basics of planning and supervision that continually lead to serious injuries and fatalities. The steps required to ensure a sufficient level of planning occurs can be simple and straight forward. The need for effective instruction, training and supervision is paramount to ensuring MRISC tasks are done in a safe manner.

MRISC activities involve maintenance, repair, installation, servicing and cleaning of machinery and equipment. People who perform these tasks are particularly vulnerable to the hazards associated on and around plant, often due to the fact that individual aspects of tasks may change every time an activity is to be undertaken. As a result of this, MRISC personnel are more likely to be injured than general operators.

Planning and supervision needs to be driven through culture. Prompt people to step back, take a few minutes and consider the risks associated with their required tasks.

Safety Supervision

Production supervision and safety supervision are not the same. Safety supervision involves consideration of:

• Time: Determine the time required to safely and efficiently complete the task.
• Risk: Identify the risks associated with the task, conduct risk assessments, etc.
• Skills/Experience: Determine the level of supervision required – this may differ for individual aspects of the task, provide an explanation of how the job is to be done, recognise that jobs change everyday for maintenance personnel and that they may not be familiar with the specifics of the task.
• Workplace Culture: People need to step up – there is currently a lack of supervision, monitoring, etc. These are simple and basic issues that keep coming up. It is about planning, consulting and providing a safe workplace. It is about empowering people to make the right decision rather than settling for second best. If you need to stray away from the JSA or feel that the task you are undertaking is unsafe, ask for help, don’t just continue along with the job.

Contractors

It is important to recognise that contractors must not be treated differently to employees. You have the same obligations under Occupational Health and Safety legislation to manage the health and safety of the contractors on your site as you do for your own employees.

In addition, never assume or take for granted that contractors or labour hire workers are competent to safety fulfill their tasks, if something goes wrong you may be held liable. To assist in ensuring the safety of contractors:

• Ensure contractors have the skills, knowledge, competency, certificates/licences, etc. required to safely fulfill their duties
• Define the job, tasks and roles to ensure the contractor knows what to do and how to do it
• Complete a JSA, Risk Assessment, checklists, permits, etc. to ensure that hazards and risk are identified and controlled
• Consider the level of supervision required for the various aspects of the task
• Consult with the contractor in the process so that they have an understanding of what is expected of them

Something to consider…

Incidents have occurred where an employee has isolated plant/equipment electronically but overlooked hydraulic and/or pneumatic isolation requirements.

Issues have arisen when plant/equipment has been purchased from overseas which does not meet Australian Standards with regards to guarding and other safety requirements.

For further information please visit the WorkSafe website at www.worksafe.vic.gov.au

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