Slade Brockman (WA, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

As Deputy Chair of the Education and Employment References Committee I rise to briefly add some remarks on the same committee report. I certainly wish to associate myself with the remarks of Senator Marshall vis-a-vis the extraordinary work put in by the secretariat and by all our colleagues who participated in the inquiry. I have recently been appointed as deputy chair, so I was not participating throughout this inquiry. I only came along to the last hearing once I had joined the committee. But, from reading the transcripts of what had transpired beforehand, you certainly get a very strong sense that the situations that were being investigated and looked at by the committee were deeply, deeply harrowing for the families involved. Losing a loved one in an industrial accident is always going to be a tragedy, and nothing can help those people overcome that loss.

But I do wish to acknowledge all the work that went into the committee report. I thank the secretariat and thank all my fellow committee members. The report and its findings are an important step forward in the area of workplace health and safety. Workplace related injuries and illness carry significant tangible costs to the community, individuals, family, workmates and workplaces. The health and safety of workers is of the utmost importance to all, particularly the prevention of serious injuries and deaths in Australian workplaces. It has to be a fundamental objective of Australian safety laws and associated frameworks to ensure that all workers come home safely after every day at work.

The inquiry has taken into consideration extensive evidence from a wide range of sources and witnesses, including many of those who have lost loved ones. We have listened carefully to the evidence by family members, colleagues and friends of those who have died, and we thank them for their courage in sharing their stories and experiences. Their willingness to share these very painful experiences has been critical in helping our understanding of the importance of support for victims' families, and that I think is one of the key sets of recommendations to come out of this report.

There were a diverse range of views and approaches presented on the adequacy of the current framework surrounding prevention, investigation and prosecution of industrial deaths in Australia. Whilst coalition senators support many of the recommendations in the report, there are some that we support in part and there are others that we are not able to support. We believe that the key here is to have the most effective policy response to achieve the best outcome. And more Commonwealth law is not always the way to do that, particularly when you're looking at an ongoing harmonisation of a series of state jurisdictions where the states have significant responsibilities in this area.

It is also worth noting that we have seen a reduction in industrial deaths in workplace fatalities over the last decade. Yes, absolutely, any death is one death too many, but it is at least a positive to say that workplace fatalities have fallen by 50 per cent over that period of time.

Again, I wish to thank all my colleagues, but most particularly I wish to thank all those who gave evidence to the inquiry, particularly those who lost a loved one in an industrial accident. Thank you.