Construction Safety Audit Happiness

Many people would wonder about someone who is actually happy about having a Construction Safety Audit, but it truly can be used as a positive tool at your construction site. It is all a matter of attitude. Instead of being fearful or intimidated by an audit, you should look at is as a reflection of the careful planning you and your construction team have put into the safety process.

A Construction Safety Audit should not come as a surprise to any construction project, therefore you should have been pro-active and had all your basis covered in advance. Once the audit is complete, you will know whether your checks and balances were proper or if you have any deficiencies that you need to repair. Every Construction workers must be safe, from the highest paid to the lowest. Safety is a major issue.

In statistics recorded in 2007-2008 the construction industry employed 9% of the Australian workforce. In this workforce, there were approximately 39 employees per day who were injured in one way or another that caused them to miss at least one week of work. These are just the injuries, the 37 fatalities recorded in the same report indicates a incident rate of 5.6 per 100,000 in the construction industry. This is more than twice the rate of all other industries fatalities. To prove that Construction Safety Audit is important, this two statistics are enough prove.

In recent legal proceedings held, there have been many incidents where there have been breaches in section 24 (1) of the Workplace Health and Safety Act 1995, having failed to ensure workplace safety. Because of these incidents, the Government is making its presence felt in the construction industies by auditing hundreds of construction sites. This move is part of the Government’s initiative to improve the sector’s safety performance.

These audits are focusing on many safety issues but falling from heights appears to be a major focus. Workplace claims jumps from 8 percent in 2003 to 14 percent in 2008. These claims should be going down in percentage not going up. Each every workers must be safe. In addition to falling issues, the Construction Safety Audit will also review safety issues pertaining to scaffolding, physical tasks and fatigue. In the past, many employers felt they were meeting safety standards by simply telling their employees about a dangerous situation was sufficient, but this is not the case. Actions need to be taken.

For example a building company was contracted to do some work on a house and the building company owner hired a couple workers. One of the workers fell to his death through a hole in the floor that was left there by another contractor. Even though the owner verbally warned his worker, he was found responsible for causing the workers death by not taking action. Precautionary actions and barricade must be taken. Even though this owner felt he did warn his employee, it wasn’t and he could have be advised of this before the tragedy if he had undergone a Construction Safety Audit. Because of this situation, I am convinced a responsible site manager will be happy to have a Construction Safety Audit.