Workplace Facilities
All workplaces, including civil and commercial construction sites, must provide safe work areas and healthy facilities for workers. Workers must be able to enter, exit, work, and move within a workplace safety - including in an emergency.
Awareness of Hazards
A critical requirement for safe workplaces is safe and clear entrances and exits. Materials, rubbish, debris, slip, and trip hazards can hinder evacuations, increase fire risks, and injure workers.
Worker health and safety is also endangered by poor lighting and ventilation, excessive noise, moisture and wet floors, effluent, dust, fumes, and extreme temperatures. Psychosocial hazards such as fatigue, work demands, and urgency pose risks for worker wellbeing.
Understanding Risks
Safe workplaces provide the basic requirements for worker health. This includes facilities for personal care and hygiene, drinking water, eating meals, taking breaks in comfort, and rest areas for illness and first aid. Where applicable, employers need to ensure workers can store and change clothes, and wash and shower.
Construction work presents challenges because of hostile environments, changing conditions, and exposure to weather. Safe work environments should have clean and safe wall and floor surfaces, adequate lighting and ventilation, safe electricity supply, and provide protection against extreme temperatures.
Safe worker behaviours include being mentally and physically fit for work, storing tools and materials safely, and helping to maintain clean and healthy facilities. Unsafe behaviours are ignoring hazards, poor ‘housekeeping’, not taking breaks, poor diet and hydration, and not wearing PPE correctly
Eliminate or Minimise Risks
Risk controls focus on either the hazard or the behaviour of workers and others.
Eliminate the hazard. Drainage. Remove waste, falling, trip, and slip hazards. Clear access and egress. Refrigerators. Secure lockers.
Substitute the hazard. Battery powered tools, portable toilets, hydration stations.
Isolate the hazard. Shaded areas. Waste disposal. Storage for tools and hazardous materials.
Use engineered modifications. Lighting, ventilation, dust extraction, air conditioning, duckboards and mats, temporary electrical systems, and RCDs.
Focusing on human behaviours include:
Administration of safe systems of work. Cleaning, housekeeping, regular breaks, hydration, health monitoring. Emergency drills. Meetings. Job rotation.
Personal protection equipment (PPE). Sunblock. Clothing for hot or cold conditions.
businesses are Site Safe members.
SiteWise members.
people trained every year.