'TIS THE SEASON
After what feels like the longest year, we find ourselves coming in to the holiday season. Think Christmas parties, farewell lunches, social club gatherings, the races, party dresses, ugly Christmas sweaters, the lists goes on! However, in a lot of cases this also means alcohol consumption to some degree and the expectation of social behavior can be somewhat forgotten. Now would be a good time to remind your team of acceptable social behavior's to ensure the health and safety of everyone without jeopardizing a fun event.
Things to consider: • Implementing a Social Policy (we have one available, please contact the office if you would like to purchase one) • Setting a limit for the number of drinks per person (and reminding all team members that this is a LIMIT not a target) • Ensuring there are non-alcoholic drinks available • Having food available • Phone numbers for Taxi's/Uber readily available
GIVEWISE
Thank you to all who have supported our fundraising efforts so far for Huggable Hearts. Here is where we are at with our efforts so far. Last month we held the quiz night at The Keg Room. It was a great night filled with fun, laughter and of course a bit of friendly competition. That evening we raised $1230.50. At Huggable Hearts, they have a remembrance garden with a special painted rock for every angel gone too soon. The team at Safewise devoted their time to paint rocks and set up a movie night held for baby loss awareness week.
We also continue to support Huggable Hearts and are aiming to donate 450kg of rice. We have untill December to meet our target amount.
If you wish to donate some rice, please drop it off to the team in the Safewise office or give to your consultant at your November safety meeting. All donations are greatly appreciated.
CONSULTANT CORNER
Each month one of our consultants (Tracey, Chantelle or Patricio) will provide you with a snippet of health and safety information. This month Chantelle will chat about what she has been up to.
Chantelle's Chats This month I want to talk about noise in the workplace. A lot of employers and employees assume that just because they do not have heavy machinery or loud activities taking place in the workplace, that they are not exposed to noise. Noise at work can be harmful to hearing, but this can be prevented if the correct measures are put in place. Find out what your workers already know about noise, and make sure they understand that once hearing is lost, it will not come back.
You must, so far as is reasonably practicable, make sure that your workers, or people that visit your workplace are not exposed to noise levels that are: • equivalent to 85 decibels averaged over 8 hours, or • a peak noise level over 140 decibels.
This always applies, whether or not your workers are wearing hearing protection. Make sure your workers always wear hearing protection if it is needed. Remember, hearing protection is the least effective control measure, and should only be considered after you have tried to eliminate or minimise the noise risk. A competent person will be able to tell you if a detailed noise assessment is needed. This will identify noise sources and high-risk areas and tasks at your work. The health of your workers is just as important as the health of your business.
