As was made very clear today, the Government has no plans to water-down Tasmania’s OH&S laws.
As part of the COAG deregulation agenda, all states – including the Labor states – have agreed to Workplace Health and Safety Ministers investigating ways the national model WHS laws could be improved to make compliance easier for business and workers.
This is not a secret. The Tasmanian Government publicly announced it was involved in this process in May 2014 and in a number of subsequent COAG communiques.
It is telling that Lazy Labor apparently only woke up to this today – 16 months later.
Over recent months, Workplace Health and Safety Ministers have undertaken further discussions on improving the national WHS laws and their progress will be reported back to COAG in November.
Under no circumstances will the Government do anything which will compromise the health and safety of Tasmanian workers.
Peter Gutwein, Treasurer
