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66 Independence Group NL
OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH
Occupational health management has many facets. Our intention is to manage our work
environment in a way that effectively minimises the exposure of our people to hazards that have
the potential to cause long-term or chronic health impacts. Some hazards are readily managed while
some are intrinsically difficult to manage. In this section we address two issues of particular note:
1) RISK-BASED HYGIENE MANAGEMENT PLANNING
As of May 2015 mines in Western Australia were required to understand:
1.
What our people are actually and potentially exposed to.
2.
How our people are protected (or not) from these exposures.
3.
What needs to be done for their protection in the short-term and long-term? (known as ‘controls’)
and implement:
4. Processes to confirm whether or not the ‘controls’ have been implemented and are effective.
5.
A process for continuously monitoring and reviewing hygiene management.
At present IGO is variously developing or implementing the new requirements.
In FY2015 IGO had no claims for industrial disease.
2) FUNCTIONAL CAPACITY
A common feature of the Australian mining workforce is an ageing demographic. The longer a person
is in a role that requires hard physical labour, the greater the risk that they will develop some chronic
injury. This presents real challenges for the individuals involved and the business who have a duty
of care. IGO, like the business sector in general, continues to examine how this challenge is best
managed.
In FY2015 IGO had 30 workers compensation claims for workplace injuries.