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House of Assembly - Fifty-Third Parliament, First Session (53-1)
2014-12-04 Daily Xml
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SafeWork SA Regional Offices

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (15:44): My question is now to the Minister for Industrial Relations. Minister, can you update the house on the future of regional SafeWork SA offices, particularly in Berri and Port Lincoln?

The Hon. J.R. RAU (Enfield—Deputy Premier, Attorney-General, Minister for Justice Reform, Minister for Planning, Minister for Housing and Urban Development, Minister for Industrial Relations) (15:44): I don't have that information with me off the top of my head. I do recognise it is an important question because, obviously, regional areas have as much interest in having safe workplaces as metropolitan areas do. The fact is that we are undertaking a number of measures at the moment in conjunction with the rollout of the new return-to-work legislation which will see enhanced—

Ms Redmond interjecting:

The Hon. J.R. RAU: Are you done? Are you finished? Good, thank you. It will see enhanced opportunities for there to be delivery of these services around the state and, in fact, the member for Chaffey might be interested to know—

Ms Redmond interjecting:

The SPEAKER: The member for Heysen is called to order.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: Thank you.

The Hon. A. Koutsantonis: I think it's spontaneous, but it's uncontrollable.

The SPEAKER: The Treasurer is a heartbeat away from departing the chamber.

The Hon. J.R. RAU: The member for Chaffey may be interested to know that during our recent country cabinet visit I spent a bit of time in Port Lincoln, which I realise is not in the honourable member's electorate. I was talking to a number of the people there who are doing programs to improve safety in the workplace and who are very keen to be involved in the progress that is going to be rolled out over the next few months leading up to the introduction of the new return-to-work scheme in January.

The point I am trying to make with those answers is, first of all, as to your specific question about SafeWork SA, I will get you an answer on that, but I would like to make the point to the member for Chaffey and others that the role of having a safe workplace is a broader role than just SafeWork SA. It includes risk management, education and other functions, some of which are being delivered by other agencies.

In particular there is a tooling up going on within the Return to Work SA side of things to be able to use the mobile case managers that they will have visiting workplaces, some 130 or so of these people, including in regional South Australia. The idea is that those regional case managers, when they actually pay a visit to a workplace in order to assist an employer and an employee who have had an injury in that workplace, would also be able to deliver safe work messages there and provide training or at least assist in connecting that employer with the appropriate training so that that employer and their staff can provide a better, safer workplace.

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