What's the cost of an eye?
I remember watching the TV ads of charities asking for money for life saving surgery and small amounts of money to save peoples eyesight. It seemed impossible that people were so poor that they were blind when a surgery that cost less than $100 would give them back their sight and in turn their life. But I had that very same experience watching some tradies work in my own home recently.
Now here at WHS Policies & Procedures Australia (WHSPPA) we understand the conflict that occurs between Workplace Health & Safety (WHS) or Occupational Health & Safety (OHS) as it was known and getting the job done. The pressure from clients, principal contractors and the need to put food on the table is immense. But there are times when we need to take stock of what we give up for that extra few minutes, that extra dollar.
In my own experience, I was watching a young tradie (not an apprentice I might add) take out part of a wall. It was an internal wall away from where the rest of the tradies were working outside. I wasn’t paying much attention to what was going on as the client that day, as I worked in my home office. It wasn’t until the young man politely knocked on my door and asked for a cotton bud so he could try to get some plaster out of his eye that I started to become concerned. The junior Plumber in this case had been hammering away at the internal wall and part of the wall had blown back into his eyes.
Being something of a safety nerd, I got out the first aid kit and the saline etc and helped him get what was a rather large piece of gyprock or plaster board from the wall out of his eye. I politely reminded him that there was a good reason why safety glasses were invented, and he replied “yeah no problems I have some glasses I will wear”. The very next time I walked past I saw him wearing his fashionable sunglasses whilst hammering away. Some what frustrated I cleaned off a pair of my safety glasses and gave them to him and told him to keep them.
The point of this isn’t to say look at me I gave a way a pair of safety glasses to a young guy and now I’ve elevated myself to the likes of Doctor Fred Hollows. No, my point is this, how much would you pay to save your eye sight. As a person in your twenties the potential of wearing an eye patch for the rest of your life seems far fetched for some but should be a real concern. Time off work, pain, unable to do some of the things you used to do, never being or looking the same again. It seems well worth the expense, effort and time. As an employer, foreman etc, what does the simple adherence to Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) cost you? More importantly what does it save you. A full set of PPE, which of all your tools and equipment is usually the cheapest elements of your work essentials, can be purchased for a couple of hundred dollars. But it will be of no use unless it is used and used constantly. One accident in the workplace will cost you years of increased workers compensation insurance premiums. Not to mention down time and reduced capacity in the workplace as well as potential years of legal battles. But more than this one of your workmates or a person under your charge will have lost something that can never be returned, and it could be in part or wholly your fault.
At WHSPPA we can provide you all the WHS Policies, WHS
Procedures and Safe Work Method Statements (SWMS) that you need for your trade.
We can cater for your WHS needs whether you are a plumber that needs SWMS and
Carpenter that needs a WHS Policy or a Builder that needs an entire WHS system.
We can do it all and we have done it all. In fact, we are among the best in the
business of Safety at work. But no matter what documentation we provide, it
will be of no use to you if you don’t put the WHS documentation you have into
practice.
Now if you have read this far you may be thinking yes but I
have so much to do as a small business owner and no one complies with their WHS
Policies. To this I would respond by saying if that was the case why do the
biggest and most successful companies no matter if they are principal
contractors, form work providers right out to shooting contractors use our team
at WHSPPA to audit their job sites. The reason is they understand the cost to
them when they get it wrong or someone doesn’t follow the procedures.
The bottom line is this – don’t be the case study of
tomorrow, be the success story of today.