There has been a 31 per cent reduction in injuries at Tasmanian mine sites across the last 10 years, according to the just-released 2020 Tasmania Industry Overview: Work Health and Safety Performance report.
It comes as Tasmania as a whole experienced a 21 per cent reduction in workplace injuries across the same time span.
The Tasmania Industry Overview covers safety performance data and trends across the state, sourced from the WorkSafe Tasmania Information Management System (WIMS) through licensees, self-insurers and the Tasmanian State Service.
As part of its Strategic Plan 2018-2023, WorkSafe Tasmania has introduced a number of strategies to ensure the Tasmanian community is ‘safe and well, every day’.
These include an emphasis on targeted harm reduction and building culture and capability where education and engagement is a particular focus.
WorkSafe Tasmania has strived to inform the community on injury trends and areas of risk to work towards improved health, safety and wellbeing outcomes.
The Mines Work Health and Safety (Supplementary Requirements) Amendment Act 2020 was passed by parliament in November 2020 providing a number of amendments from its predecessor, the Mines Work Health and Safety (Supplementary Requirements) Act 2012.
This ensured that Tasmania’s mining safety laws were better aligned with the state’s health and safety laws at large.
As part of this, there was a significant increase in some penalties. Namely, the maximum penalty for a mine operation that failed to appoint a site senior officer increased from $13,000 to $100,000.
WorkSafe Tasmania has a comprehensive website summarising all the recent updates made to the bill. You can find this here: https://bit.ly/3k6VHSz