When last have you had a look at the Occupational Health and Safety Act? If you haven't looked at it recently, I suggest you take a couple minutes, download the amended act and read though it thoroughly.
http://www.labour.gov.za/legislation/acts/occupational-health-and-safety/occupational-health-and-safety-act-and-amendments
The act starts with the following sentence: “To provide health and safety to persons at work and for the health and safety of persons in connection with the use of plan and machinery.”
If you don’t have time to read through all 27 pages, I suggest you start with Section 38: “Offences, penalties and special orders of the court”. I'm sure that will convince you to read through the whole document.
Isn’t it sad that we have to have laws like these in place to dictate something that should really be our moral obligation towards our colleagues, employees and employers?
Awareness is free. Sharing basic safety knowledge is a good way of ensuring a safe working environment.
Tools and standard easy-to-follow- business practices are available to support a safe working environment. None of these tools are ignored more than preventative maintenance - the easiest place to save money without the immediate negative effects being evident.
Preventative maintenance isn’t just about saving money, extending the life of your equipment, production output and quality; it’s ensuring that machinery doesn't become a safety hazard.
Q-CMMS is a tool to facilitate preventative maintenance actions, allowing you to maintain your equipment to acceptable standards for a safer working environment. Q-CMMS is user friendly and will help you manage the maintenance of anything from a ladder to your most complex machinery.
For more information on Q-CMMS please visit the QBCon website.
