New mining safety regulation as death toll risesWill this safety case response be the solution to deaths on minesites or be just a blame and money shifting exercise?What are the real causes of the latest spike of deaths in the mining industry in the current year?
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New mining safety regulation as death toll rises
AJA STYLES
September 2, 2009
The Minister for Mines and Petroleum Norman Moore has announced new safety regulations for the mining industry after the death toll on mines rose to six this year.
An Alcoa contractor died early yesterday after falling down a shaft at the company's Wagerup alumina refinery, 110km south-east of Perth.
The contractor 50-year-old Paul Herbert Fry, a contract foreman for Trans Pacific Industrial Solutions who lived in the Mandurah suburb of Erskine.
Safety investigators from the Department of Mines and Petroleum are still preparing a report into the circumstances leading up to the death for the State Coroner.
Mr Moore said the number of mine-related deaths had spiked significantly this year, up from two the previous years and he feared the sector had become "complacent".
"Even one death, is one too many," he said.
The government now intends to make mining companies follow a safety model used by petroleum sector, where companies are more self-regulated at a fracture of the cost to tax-payers.
Mr Moore said the Petroleum Safety Case Regime has been successful since it was introduced after the 1970s Alpha North Seas explosion, which killed 167 men.
He said in WA, no deaths had occurred on oil rigs in the past couple of years.
The scheme requires companies to assess out their own safety risks and put in pace their own management schemes to reduce the risks, which can then be fully audited by the government.
Currently the government conducts all the risk assessment and checks at mine sites at a cost of $18 million a year.
Implementing a Safety Case Regime for mining companies is estimated to cost the companies $35 million, with the government still spending $5m.
Mr Moore said it will mean safety inspector numbers will be boosted from 80 to 115, of which 60 inspectors will work in the mining sector.
He said he hopes it will allow WA to become more competitive with the federal regulatory bodies in employing highly-qualified inspectors.
The regime will be introduced over three years to allow smaller mining companies to prepare for it.
New mining safety regulation as death toll rises (4 September 2009)"
http://www.watoday.com.au/wa-news/new-mining-safety-regulation-as-death-toll-rises-20090902-f8ag.html
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