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FACILITIES MANAGEMENT
REFOCUSSING
SUSTAINABILITY
With a new government in place and a more settled commercial environment
nationally, the Facility Management Association of Australia (FMA) now has the
opportunity to widen the focus of sustainability and include social impacts, such
as health, safety and wellbeing. FMA Chief Executive Of?cer, Nicholas Burt,
has signalled the need for the industry to work proactively with government to
strengthen the focus on this important aspect.
Most years the facilities management industry
faces challenges and uncertainties, but this year
it included the unprecedented early election
announcement. At the time, Prime Minister Julia
Gillard said, “Announcing the election date
now enables individuals and business, investors
and consumers to plan their year,” but without
certainty of outcome, the extended timeframe
effectively put the brake on many projects.
Increasingly the focus of sustainability has
been on environmental impacts such as energy
efficiency, carbon management etc., while the
social aspects, those that protect and improve the
health, safety and well-being of workers, visitors
and residents have not shared the spotlight.
With the election behind us and a new government
in place, there is a cautious optimism and
revitalised activity. For the FMA this has included
raising awareness at an industry and governmental
level of the need to create a more holistic
approach to operational FM and provide a balance
in addressing environmental and social issues.
This need was highlighted by the recent Safe
Work Australia’s 2013 ‘Key Work Health and
Safety Statistics’ which has shown that when it
comes to health and safety little has changed
from year to year, and could in fact be worsening.
In 2009–10, there were 131,170 workers’
compensation claims for serious work-related
injuries or illnesses, equating to an incidence
rate of 13.0 serious claims per 1000 employees.
Preliminary data for 2010–11 show there were
127,330 serious workers’ compensation claims.
Although this equates to 12.2 serious claims
per 1000 employees, the actual final number of
accepted claims for that year is likely to be around
2% higher.
Govlink Issue 2 2013
One shocking statistic that is often downplayed
is workplace related deaths. In 2010-11, 220
workers, or 1.93 per 100,000 workers, died due to
an injury incurred at work.
An important aspect of the FM professional’s role
is compliance and risk management. As such, a
wide array of regulations and standards apply to
the management, maintenance and operation
of buildings to ensure, among other things, the
health and safety of occupants.
Earlier this year the FMA in conjunction with
Programmed FM undertook an industry wide
Census. Stakeholders in the facility management
supply chain including service procurers, facility
management practitioners, through to FM goods
and services suppliers were asked to identify
areas of priority.
One significant outcome was that health and
safety enhancement was not seen as a top three
priority for 2012 but respondents did see it as a
top three priority moving forward over the next
three years.
It is pleasing that the Census indicated a growing
awareness around the importance of risk and
safety issues, but this now needs to be prioritised.
Aside from the human cost due to work place
injury there are also economic costs, as also
demonstrated by the Safe Work Australia 2013
‘Key Work Health and Safety Statics’:
• A typical serious workers’ compensation claim
involves four weeks absence from work;
• One-quarter of serious claims required 12 or
more weeks off work; and,