In the past, Australia’s vast array of workplace regulations made OHS compliance about as easy as blindfolded origami. Regulatory standards changed from state to state and figuring out which worksafe Australia codes of practice applied to which job required scrolling through pages of health and safety laws written in complicated legal-lingo. This cost businesses time and money, so in 2008 Safe Work Australia was established with the aim of streamlining this process.

Understanding the role of Safe Work Australia is central to comprehending the broader network of OHS regulations. Although the Work Health and Safety Act is long and complicated, Safe Work Australia works to standardise health and safety laws, prepare workplace codes of practice and suggest policy improvements to the government. In essence, Safe Work Australia is a model of health and safety codes of practice and OHS laws and regulations, that is reviewed by the government and then adopted by the respective states and territories.