A health and safety audit aims to identify strengths and opportunities for improvement to an organisation’s WHS management system and should be conducted on a regular basis.
An audit is a document or process for reviewing a health and safety system, program or workplace practice to ensure compliance with law, established guidelines and WHS leading practice.
Audits are useful methods to monitor and evaluate an organisation’s health and safety systems to ensure safety standards and the legal compliance of the business. The WHS Act imposes specific obligations on businesses to provide a safe place to work, provide safe systems at work and consult with workers about safety. There are also secondary duties to identify hazards, manage risks and implement and monitor control measures. The capacity to carry out these critical duties requires the business to undertake audits.
Officers under the WHS Act have a positive duty of due diligence to make sure the person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) complies with health and safety standards. This means a system must be in place that:
collects the appropriate information about hazards;
identifies the risk of such hazards; and
empowers workers and managers to resource, monitor and improve controls to eliminate/minimise health and safety risk in the workplace.
Benefits of health and safety auditing
Conducting regular audits will help the organisation to:
proactively identify potential hazards before they cause incidents
identify equipment problems resulting from such things as wear and tear or improper use
identify improper work practices
identify good health and safety practices, and
identify new hazards resulting from changes in the workplace.
When to audit
In addition to daily or weekly workplace inspections, and weekly or monthly monitoring of safety practices of procedures by line management, audits should be conducted approximately every three months to verify that specific elements of the WHS management system are working as intended. Further, annual audits of the safety management system as a whole should be conducted. The frequency with which you should conduct a WHS audit in the workplace will also depend on:
the degree of risk associated with the activities of the business
management commitment to continuous improvement in health and safety performance, and
whether there is a reason to believe that health and safety requirements are not being met.
Records management
An organisation must document all steps taken to monitor its safety performance, including all inspections, reviews and audits. These records are important if an incident occurs and evidence is required to demonstrate due diligence was exercised. An organisation’s documentation procedures should:
provide evidence of its proactive health and safety management
ensure that management is aware of organisational performance
assist with continuous improvement
demonstrate a commitment to continuous improvement in health and safety performance
enable a more effective performance, and
ensure review of individual manager’s health and safety performance.
Audit requirements
Given that the purpose of an audit is to assist in a continuous improvement of the organisation’s health and safety procedures, an effective audit should:
identify strengths and weaknesses
assess compliance with statutory obligations
compare current documentation and practices against best practices and legal obligations
recommend improvements
ensure that adequate resources to manage health and safety are provided
ensure that the resources devoted to health and safety are being used affectively, and
educate the officers of the PCBU about gaps in safety of the PCBU and provide risk-based evidence on the level of risk associated with each gap.
An audit may be an independent event or part of a role in the WHS program. It can focus on a particular activity, a particular part of the business, or the overall performance of the WHS management system.
An organisation should develop guidelines and procedures that describe how internal audits should be conducted and what areas of the business they would cover. There are various elements of a business that may need to be audited separately. A few examples include health and safety planning processes, health and safety consultative arrangements, operating procedures for all equipment, emergency procedures and ergonomic risks.
An audit should be undertaken by an appropriately trained internal staff member or team, or an external third party with appropriate qualifications, training and experience.
Further Information
Safework Australia: Code of Practice – How to manage work health and safety risks
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