Health & Safety of SSSO s in WMR.
Since commencing as Health and Safety Reps (HSR s) in WMR, HSR Chris Duffy, Deputies Sheryl Tunnecliff and Laura Street have made an impact on the Health and Safety of SSSO s in the region.

Supervision project.
This entailed setting up supervision groups and external supervision for the supervisors. This benefited everyone in the process. It also helped to continually improve professional practice, and the Department has enthusiastically adopted this.

An effective OHS committee.
As members must be aware, there was no separate structure that covered SSSO s in DEECD. One of the achievements has been the constant improvement of the OHS Committee, seeing it now represent all work streams in the Regions, and a forum where issues can be dealt with and prioritised.

Working on improving consultation processes
Commencing with the ‚Äö?Ñ??Student Services Operations Guidelines‚Äö?Ñ??, WMR s HSR and Deputies have made the Department accountable by taking this issue forward. Health and safety issues hadn t been included in the guidelines draft by the Department prior to this. After lengthy negotiation involving WorkSafe, the Department and the CPSU, the then DOE consulted on health and safety issues, and included them in the guidelines.

Process for reporting Health and Safety incidents
Prior to HSR s involvement, no process for SSSO s reporting incidents existed. HSR s developed this in conjunction with Department.

Manual Handling
After raising this issue with the Region, a course on manual handling has been provided by the Department, and also trolleys for materials carried from school to school will be provided by the Department to SSSO s.

OHS presentation to SSSO s power point.
Inductions of new SSSO s now include a power point presentation on Health and Safety Representatives and their functions and employees rights to a healthy workplace.

Assisting with Base School Audit.
From an idea raised through the OHS committee, the HSR and deputies requested and received an audit of all Base School rooms in WMR. This meant significant improvement to the workspaces, and issues were addressed.

Working on guidelines for ‚Äö?Ñ??Found Space‚Äö?Ñ?? for visiting professionals in Schools.
This is reported to the State-wide OHS Committee for general application in schools state-wide.

Still Working on‚Äö?Ѭ?

‚Äö?Ѭ¢ Insisting on proper consultation about the Mann Judd report that was the rationale for the outsourcing of base assessments for children with severe language disorder and intellectual disability.

‚Äö?Ѭ¢ Proper minute taking at meetings (this is important so that responsibility can be taken. Otherwise, meetings can descend into Mangers giving directions and tasks to HSR s, not HSR s bringing issues to Managers.

Our Next bulletin about Health and Safety will outline work in SMR.

CPSU - WORKING TOGETHER TO IMPROVE OUR HEALTH AND SAFETY AT WORK.


KAREN BATT
CPSU Victorian Branch Secretary

2 April 2008