Hazard Identification and Risk Assessment

Hazard identification and risk assessment – often shortened to HIRA – is the core of work health and safety management. The model Code of Practice How to manage work health and safety risks sets out four steps:

1. Identify hazards – find out what could cause harm.
2. Assess risks – understand how serious the harm could be and how likely it is.
3. Control risks – put the most effective reasonably practicable controls in place.
4. Review controls – check they are working as planned.

A hazard is a situation or thing that has the potential to harm a person. A risk is the possibility that harm will occur when someone is exposed to the hazard. Noise is a hazard; hearing loss from eight hours a day beside an unenclosed punch is the risk.

Hazards come from the physical work environment, the equipment and substances used, the tasks and how they are performed, and the way work is designed and managed. To find them:

• Walk the workplace and watch the work as it is actually done, including cleaning, maintenance, breakdowns and night shift.
• Talk to workers. They know where the near misses happen.
• Review information – safety data sheets, manufacturers' manuals, incident and injury records, workers' compensation data, industry guidance and Codes of Practice.
• Think about health as well as safety. Fume, dust, noise, vibration, chemicals, heat and psychosocial hazards injure far more people than sudden accidents do, and they are the ones left off the list.
• Break the work into activities and list the hazards for each. It is more thorough than wandering the site with a blank form.

Use categories as a prompt so nothing is missed. For each activity ask whether any of these is present:

Health hazards occupy half of that list. In most incident-driven risk registers they occupy a line or two.

A risk assessment is not always required. If the hazard and its control are well known – a Code of Practice or the Regulations tell you what to do – you can go straight to the control. An assessment is needed where you are unsure how a hazard might cause harm, where several hazards interact, or where changes may affect the controls.

When you do assess, consider how severe the harm could be, how many people are exposed, how often and for how long, and how effective the existing controls are. Most workplaces record this on a risk matrix, rating each hazard before controls and again with the controls in place.

The WHS Regulations require controls to be chosen in order – the hierarchy of control:

1. Eliminate the hazard.
2. Substitute it with something safer, isolate people from it, or use engineering controls.
3. Use administrative controls – procedures, training, signage, rotation.
4. Use personal protective equipment.

Administrative controls and PPE are the least reliable, because they depend on people doing the right thing every time. They should support higher-order controls, not replace them. Cost alone is not a reason to choose a lower-order control unless the cost is grossly disproportionate to the risk.

Activity: unloading steel sheet packs from a flat-bed truck with a forklift.

1. Hazards identified with the forklift operator and the storeperson: pedestrians in the unloading area; load shifting when restraints are released; the driver standing beside the trailer; working on the trailer deck; diesel exhaust indoors.
2. Risks assessed. Struck by forklift or falling load: major consequence, possible – red. Fall from the trailer deck: major, possible – red. Exhaust indoors: moderate, likely – red.
3. Controls chosen, highest order first: a marked exclusion zone with physical barriers and a designated driver safe area (isolation); unloading outdoors or an electric forklift for indoor work (substitution); restraints released only after the load is checked and chocked, and no one on the deck while the forklift operates (administrative); high-visibility clothing (PPE).
4. Review after the first month and whenever the delivery pattern changes.

Four lines on a page, written with the people who do the job, is a better assessment than ten pages copied from somewhere else.

Review controls when they are not working, before a change that could create new risks, when a new hazard is identified, when consultation shows a review is needed, and when a Health and Safety Representative requests one. Set a regular interval as well; twelve months is common.

You must consult workers who are likely to be directly affected, and their Health and Safety Representatives, at each step – when identifying hazards, assessing risks and deciding on controls. Record who was consulted.

Keep a record of the hazards, the assessment, the controls and the actions. For some hazards the Regulations require records to be kept for defined periods. A clear, dated, signed record is also your evidence of due diligence if something goes wrong.