School Workplace Safety Issues

Workplace Safety issues at School

The 2024 Victorian WorkSafe criminal conviction of a school for work, health and safety failure relating to the death of a student with T1d under their care  has irrevocably established that:

• While any student is in custody of school, the school is responsible for that student’s safety and wellbeing.
• The school is legally bound to provide employees the requisite training - it is not optional. “Requisite training” for T1D at school is defined by the international authority ISPAD as “training required to qualify and authorize the performance and safe execution of necessary tasks, skills, and responsibilities in accordance with local jurisdictional requirements” 
• Workplace training must be sufficiently robust to recognise safety risks even in the face of receiving errant advice from a parent.
• School employees are unambiguously classed as employees under workplace safety law. This is consistent with legal advice provided to the Victorian Department of Education in 2014,  the case law of Mazy and National Disability Insurance Agency [2018] AATA 3099 (9 August 2018) (austlii.edu.au) and the 2017 WorkSafe ACT Notice of Improvement to Schools for students with T1D  www.cmtedd.act.gov.au/open_government/foi/cmtedd/improvement-notice-issued-by-worksafe-to-the-education-directorate.

Both ISPAD and Safe work Australia legislation directs that schools are responsible for ensuring that their personnel are adequately educated and trained in the application of prescribed treatment for the individual student.