The Law and Order Debate in OHS

By Fiona Haines and Andy Hall

Internationally there has been a shift towards greater criminalisation of breaches of OHS responsibilities, particularly when a death results.

This new criminalisation in the form of revised manslaughter provisions is argued to potentially have important deterrent effects that could improve health and safety at work. However, the evidence that offences such as industrial manslaughter will act as a deterrent to those tolerating or explicitly condoning poor industrial health and safety standards is not strong.

(CCH Journal of Occupational Health and Safety Australia and New Zealand, vol. 20, no 3, June 2004)