The new occupational health and safety laws unveiled just before Christmas are likely to see a fresh influx of visitors to Victoria's largest workplace safety event, Safety In Action and Melbourne Materials Handling, this April.
At least 10,000 visitors routinely attend the two Melbourne trade shows, while hundreds of delegates participate in Australia's largest professional OHS gathering, the associated Safety in Action Conference. Due to run from April 20 to 22 this year, Safety In Action and Melbourne Materials Handling follow the vigorous public harmonisation debate, just as Australia's economy recovers.
WorkSafe Victoria director Stan Krpan says national harmonisation presents a great opportunity for safety and its practitioners.
"Harmonisation achieved what some people thought impossible," he says. "Now is the time to start preparing for the introduction of the new laws. The indicators are that the economy is recovering and when business begins to invest again, it should be in safe outcomes. This has an enormous impact on attracting the right workers."
Mr Krpan will speak at the Safety in Action Conference presented by the Safety Institute of Australia and WorkSafe Victoria is the principal sponsor.
Aside from the model laws and recovering economy, the Safety In Action and Melbourne Materials Handling trade show will benefit from new feature areas, which host suppliers of specialist safety products and services. The fire and security area that debuted in 2009 proved popular and is tipped to expand. A brand new health and aged care feature area will provide answers to the manual handling issues that are the biggest cause of injury to the million Australian workers who belong to the sector, together with hygiene and contamination. Other feature areas will address height safety, corporate health, and training and technology.