Chris Tuck posted on September 04, 2010 11:49
Consultation Requirements under the ACT Act
Relevance: ACT
Industries: All Industries; all Businesses
Keywords: Consultation; consultation – processes
In the ACT employers have a duty to consult, as far as reasonably practicable, with the employer’s workers to allow the workers to contribute to matters directly affecting their work safety.
The employer’s duty to consult includes (but is not necessarily limited to) the following matters:
1. Identifying or assessing risks to work safety at the employer’s workplace or in relation to conducting the employer’s business or undertaking.
2. The measures to be taken to manage risks to work safety at the employer’s workplace or in relation to conducting the employer’s business or undertaking.
3. The adequacy of facilities.
4. Proposing changes that may directly affect work safety.
5. Any other issues in relation to work safety.
6. Any matter prescribed by the regulation.
Deciding how workers are to be consulted
In the ACT The employer and each worker consultation unit must decide how the employer must consult the employer’s workers in established ‘work units’. The employer and worker consultation unit may decide that the employer will consult the workers in the unit using either (1) a work safety representative elected by the workers in the unit, or (2) a work safety committee elected by the workers in the unit or (3) another stated method of consultation.
However, if more than half the workers in the worker consultation unit ask that a work safety representative, or a work safety committee, be elected, the employer must arrange for the representative or the committee to be elected by the workers in the unit. The employer and the employer’s workers may, either separately or together, ask someone else to assist in deciding on the method for worker consultation.
The Act implies that where a workplace is small enough the ideal form of consultation would be with all the workers in the workplace. However, where the workplace is large enough so that is impracticable, it provides a mechanism for establishing one or more worker consultation units.
Establishing worker consultation units
A worker consultation unit must be established ‘in a way that best and most conveniently allows the work safety interests of the workers in the unit to be represented and safeguarded.’
The employer must consult the employer’s workers in establishing the worker consultation unit. The employer and the employer’s workers may, either separately or together, ask someone else to assist in the establishment of the worker consultation unit.
In deciding the way that the worker consultation unit is established, the employer must consider the following in relation to the employer’s workers: the number and grouping of workers; workers’ working hours, including the representation of workers on shift work; the pattern of work of workers, including the representation of part-time, casual, seasonal or short-term workers; the geographic location of workplaces, including any dispersed locations, home-based work or transport work; the nature of different kinds of work carried out by workers, work arrangements and the levels of responsibility; workers’ characteristics, including gender, ethnicity, age and special needs; the hazards or risks to work safety at the workplace; the interaction of workers with the workers of other employers.
The Act also prescribes requirements in relation to the election of members of a unit, to changing the composition or role of the unit and in relation to keeping certain records about a unit. The Regulation sets out detailed provisions relating to the election of and replacement of Representatives.