This April, SafeWork SA is launching their ‘April No-Falls’ safety campaign to raise awareness on the dangers of working at height. The campaign also aims to remind duty holders that managing the risk of falls is everyone’s responsibility.
Working at height continues to be a high-risk activity and a leading cause of workplace death and serious injury in Australia. 11% of fatalities were as a result of a fall from height.
A falls from height injury can have a devastating impact physically, emotionally and financially to workers, their families and the wider community.
Throughout April we will be publishing injury and compliance information to help inform duty holders about the industries, workers and activities most at risk of a fall from height.
To launch this campaign, we have released our 2021 campaign report on the recent compliance audits undertaken on the residential construction sector.
The compliance audits were prompted after 2020 falls data identified workers in the residential construction industry were most at risk of falls from height.
During the six month compliance campaign, our inspectors conducted 96 site visits, completing 146 compliance audits with duty holders. The site visits identified 135 elevated workplaces, resulting in the issuing of:
- 185 statutory notices in response to non-compliance
- 102 prohibition notices and
- 83 improvement notices.
The campaign identified only 26% of activities undertaken at height had adequate controls in place to minimise the risk of a fall.
The full compliance report is available from the SafeWork SA website. A two page infographic summary of the report has also been prepared to highlight the trades most at risk of falls and the most common oversight that causes the risk of falls.
We are also collaborating with the Housing Industry Association (HIA) and the Master Builders Association (MBA) to host two live webinars on ‘Managing risk of falls in residential construction’.
Both webinars will be held on Friday, 22 April 2022 and will cover:
- an overview of SafeWork SA's 2021 proactive compliance campaign on the residential construction sector, including findings and trends
- shared work health and safety obligations and responsibilities of duty holders
- base design and use of scaffolds
- occupations most at risk
- Safe Work Method Statements (SWMS)
- construction projects
- safe use of ladders.
Register for free at HIA webinar 10-11am and MBA webinar 1-2pm.
SafeWork SA would like to see how you’re making April a no falls month at your workplace. If you are hosting an event or toolbox that promotes working safely at heights add it to your social channels and use the hash tag #AprilNoFalls. If your workplace promotes safety at heights and has great safe systems of work, post some photos on your socials and include the hash tags #AprilNoFalls and #WHS. We’ll promote the most impressive pictures.
Further information
Managing the risk of falls in the workplace – Approved Code of Practice
Safe work on roofs information sheet – Safe Work Australia
Managing risk of falls video series
SWMS for high risk construction work
Guardrail systems for roof work
Managing the risk of falls in housing construction – Model Code of practice
