SWA Announcing People's Choice Award Winner Nov. 30
Voting is under way on a shortlist of five finalists, including one focused on preventing welding fume exposures in the rail industry, after Safe Work Australia received more than 70 entries.
Safe Work Australia Chair Diane Smith-Gander is asking the public to vote for a winner of the People's Choice Award and determine which of the best workplace safety projects around the country will receive an extra $5,000 in funding. "As part of National Safe Work Month, we ran a competition to encourage workplaces across Australia to focus on improving their work health and safety practices," she said Nov. 16. "The shortlisted entries are a great way to see how we can approach workplace health and safety in an innovative and creative way."
Safe Work Australia received more than 70 entries and winnowed those down to a shortlist of five finalists. The overall winner will be announced on Nov. 30.
The finalists are:
- Preventing rail industry welding fume injuries - Nugroup Rail Solutions Pty Ltd: Develop and provide to the rapidly growing rail industry the best high-order prevention strategy to manage short- and long term health effects of inhaling welding fumes.
- Customised workplace health and safety training for diverse groups - House with No Steps: Customized work health and safety training for people who have intellectual, cognitive, and learning disabilities; who are deaf or hearing impaired; who have low literacy; and who come from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds.
- Hay bale lifter to prevent back injuries - Taronga Conservation Society Australia: Spring-actioned hay bale lifter to prevent back injuries from manually lifting hay bales.
- A better design for hand augers - Coffey Services Australia Ltd: Reduce injury rates and worker pain by developing an ergonomic hand auger for field investigation work around the world.
- Using lighting to create highly visible safety barriers - Arcadian Organic & Natural Meat Company Pty Ltd: Create highly and permanently visible safety zones for pedestrians using ceiling-mounted light projectors, to reduce forklift accidents.