Occupational health and safety

The department continued to proactively apply strategies aimed at reducing workplace-related injuries. A strong focus continued on rehabilitation which included assisting staff to return to work in the shortest possible time.

The continuation of the following occupational health and safety initiatives was the primary focus for the 2004-05 year:

• further development of best practice policy;
• broadening of the External Consultants policy to include all types of consultants eg rehabilitation and independent factual investigators; and
• further in-house development of the electronic reporting system to include direct access to costs.

Statistics for occupational health, safety and welfare, and workers compensation for the reporting year were as follows:

• Five hundred and ten compensation claims were received, an increase of seven over the previous reporting year.
• The number of stress claims totalled 39, a decrease of 17 from the previous year.
• The cost of all claims payments decreased by $0.724m, down from $6.348m to $5.624m. This decrease can be attributable to the finalisation of many older claims in the previous year and the reduction in claims for stress in the reporting year.
• The number of injured employees referred for rehabilitation was slightly lower than for the previous reporting period. A combination of factors was responsible for this, including a decrease in the number of claims, diminished severity of injuries and changes to the department’s rehabilitation policy, particularly in-house rehabilitation on minor claims.