Manual handling, bullying, compliance and safe work at heights workshops plus acres of the latest workplace safety products and services await visitors to The Safety Show Sydney, when it runs during Safe Work Australia Week from 27-29 October at the Sydney Showground, Sydney Olympic Park.
Sydney Materials Handling will run alongside the Safety Show, as will the inaugural CleanScene: The National Cleaning & Hygiene Expo will run alongside them.
The Safety Show Sydney and Sydney Materials Handling will present more than 300 exhibitors.
In addition to the workshops, unions and employers will engage in a debate over Australia's new occupational health and safety (OHS) laws.
Most of the argument has centred on who should carry the burden of proof: Currently, employers in New South Wales and Queensland must prove they have taken reasonable steps to ensure safety. But this would become the prosecutor's responsibility under the draft national model law.
"Any lawyer in this field will tell an employer charged with a breach of NSW's OHS Act that under the reverse onus of proof, the most sensible approach is to plead guilty and do it early," says . "People are in a system where they feel they don't stand a chance and that's not fair or credible."
On the other hand, says, "Removing the burden of proof from the employer reduces the rights and entitlements of workers. We were given repeated assurances by the governments through the COAG process that no employee in any jurisdiction would be worse off under the new nationally harmonised OHS laws."
Greg Pattison, general manager workplace solutions for the NSW Business Chamber, and Geoff Fary, assistant secretary of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), will join WorkCover NSW general manager John Watson and Professor Michael Quinlan on a panel debating harmonisation on October 27 at The Safety Conference in Sydney. The panel's moderator, OHS legal expert and author Michael Tooma says reversing the onus of proof will be largely irrelevant.
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