Find out the PCBU duties in relation to workplace health and safety.

1. PCBU DUTIES IN RELATION
TO WORKPLACE HEALTH AND
SAFETY
Diploma of OHS

2. In the Diploma of OHS we consider the various
duties of a PCBU in relation to WHS, and providing
advice to those in the workplace that are impacted
by those duties.
Personnel to be provided with advice may include PCBU‟s,
company directors, managers, supervisors, workers, health
and safety representatives and committees, and
contractors. Communication of the obligations of workplace
parties is important and should be made available as part of
induction training.

3. Key WHS duties of PCBU’s
A PCBU must ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable,
the health and safety of workers. A key qualifier of this
duty is the term reasonable practicability.

4. Reasonable Practicability
Is what can reasonably be done to eliminate or reduce a
risk in the circumstances, taking into account and weighing
up all relevant matters, including:
1. the likelihood of the relevant hazard or risk occurring;
2. the degree of harm that might result;
3. what the person knows or ought reasonably to know
about the hazard or risk and the ways of eliminating or
minimising the risk;
4. the availability and suitability of ways to eliminate or
minimise the risk; and
5. The cost of implementing risk controls, including
whether the cost is grossly disproportionate to the risk.

5. There is no legal definition of reasonable practicability but
there is an emphasis on the level of care that would be
considered reasonable by today‟s standards. The following
statements by the courts high light the central elements
when determining what reasonable practicability is.
“…what reasonable care requires will vary with the advent of
new methods and machines and with changing ideas of
justice and increasing concern with safety in the community
… What is considered to be reasonable in the circumstances
of the case must be influenced by current community
standards.”
Bankstown Foundry case final appeal: Mason, Wilson
and Dawson JJ (160 CLR 301).

6. “The overall test is the conduct of a reasonable and prudent
PCBU taking positive thought for the safety of his workers in
light of what he knows or ought to know; where there is a
recognized and general practice which has been followed for
a substantial period in similar circumstances without mishap,
he is entitled to follow it unless in the light of common sense
or newer knowledge it is clearly bad; where there is
developing knowledge, he must reasonably keep abreast of it
and not be too slow to apply it; where he has in fact greater
than average knowledge of the risks, he may therefore be
obliged to take more than the average or standard
precautions.”
Swanwick J. in Stokes v Guest, Keen and Nettlefold
(Bolts and Nuts) Ltd (1968) 1 WLR 1776

7. What is considered reasonable in any particular OHS case
will depend on the specific circumstances.
“such a responsibility (to reduce risk so far as reasonably
practicable) can only be discharged by taking an active,
imaginative and flexible approach to potential dangers.
Each case must be decided on its own facts”
Holmes v Re Spence Pty Ltd (1992)

8. The Impact of Cost
After taking into account matters 1 – 4, only then can the
person consider the cost associated with available ways of
eliminating or minimising the risk, including whether the
cost is grossly disproportionate to the risk.
The risk and severity of injury must be weighed up against
the overall cost and feasibility of the safeguards needed to
remove the risk. Common practice and knowledge
throughout the relevant industry are taken into account
when judging whether a safeguard is „reasonably
practicable‟.

9. Individual PCBU‟s could not claim that they did not know
what to do about certain hazards if those hazards were
widely known by others in the same industry, and
safeguards were in place elsewhere.
The cost of putting safeguards in place is measured
against the consequences of failing to do so. It is not a
measure of whether the PCBU can afford to put the
necessary safeguards in place. While cost is a factor, it is
not an excuse for failing to provide appropriate safeguards,
particularly where there is risk of serious, or frequent but
less severe, injury.

10. The legislation specifies duties of PCBU’s including
providing:
a) a safe working environment;
b) safe plant and structures;
c) safe systems of work;
d) safe use, handling and storage of plant and substances;
e) adequate facilities;
f) information instruction and training; and
g) monitoring of the workplace.
In 1949 the Court of Appeal (UK) clarified the relationship
between cost and reducing risk as low as reasonably
practicable.

11. The definition set out by the Court of Appeal (in its
judgment in Edwards v. National Coal Board, [1949] 1 All
ER 743) is:
“„Reasonably practicable‟ is a narrower term than „physically
possible‟ … a computation must be made by the owner in
which the quantum of risk is placed on one scale and the
sacrifice involved in the measures necessary for averting
the risk (whether in money, time or trouble) is placed in the
other, and that, if it be shown that there is a gross
disproportion between them – the risk being insignificant in
relation to the sacrifice – the defendants discharge the onus
on them.”

12. In essence, making sure a risk has been reduced ALARP is
about weighing the risk against the sacrifice needed to
further reduce it. The decision is weighted in favour
of workplace health and safety because the presumption
is that the duty-holder should implement the risk reduction
measure. To avoid having to make this sacrifice, the duty-
holder must be able to show that it would be grossly
disproportionate to the benefits of risk reduction that would
be achieved.
Thus, the process is not one of balancing the costs and
benefits of measures but, rather, of adopting measures
except where they are ruled out because they involve
grossly disproportionate sacrifices.

13. Extreme examples might be:
- To spend $1m to prevent five staff possibly suffering
bruised knees is obviously grossly disproportionate; but
- To spend $1m to prevent a major explosion capable of
killing 150 people is obviously proportionate.

14. LMIT delivers the Certificate IV in OHS and
the Diploma in Occupational Health &
Safety Completely Online in Sydney, Melbourne,
Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide and
Canberra. The Advanced Diploma in OHS is also
available via RPL only.