The Quarterly safety report – July to September 2024 has been released to better inform industry when reviewing safety management systems and undertaking risk assessments at their sites. The report details incidents and trends relating to hazard management, in addition to sector specific information.
As a high-hazard regulator, we focus on compliance with legislative requirements associated with principal and other high-risk hazards. ‘Roads or other vehicle operating areas’, ‘fires or explosion’ and ‘air quality or dusts and other airborne contaminants’ are hazards that feature regularly in incident notifications to the Regulator.
In this quarter, there were a total of 590 incident notifications received – an 11% increase from the same period in FY2023 and 14% increase from the previous quarter.
There were 2 fatalities during the quarter. One was work related; the other was non-work related.
Incident notifications increased for coal mines (16%) and large mines (11%) compared to the previous quarter. Conversely, the small mines sector saw a 21% decrease of notified incidents. Assessments decreased by 6% overall this quarter, although proactive desktop assessments increased by 26%. Decreases were seen in every sector except opal mines and exploration sites.
Safety notices increased markedly this quarter from 432 to 779 (180%). This was predominantly led by an increase in s191 improvement notices issued (from 257 to 528).
You can access the report on our activity and safety reports page.