What changes on 1 July
The driver behind the change is a new section inserted into the Work Health and Safety Act, Section 26 capital A. In short, where the Minister approves a code of practice, a business must comply with that code and manage the relevant hazards to a standard equal to, or higher than, what the code sets out.
This is not to suggest codes of practice didn't matter beforehand. They were always material a prosecutor could rely on. But Section 26A gives them far greater importance. Businesses now need to pay very careful attention to the codes and go through them with a fine-tooth comb, whether the issue is psychosocial hazards, fatigue, or any other code of practice the Minister has approved.
The cost of getting it wrong
Regulators expect evidence that psychosocial safety is managed systematically. You apply the same rigour you would to a plant or manual handling risk assessment: identify, assess and control. The challenge is that there is a lot of ambiguity about what a psychosocial hazard actually is, and it is incumbent on the business to identify them.
The pressure is also financial and personal. Mental health claims are rising, the icare deficit is reported to be growing by around $7 million a day, and there is now personal liability for officers and managers, backed by fines and prosecutions under the Act.
National 17 vs NSW 15: what's the difference?
There are 17 hazards under the national code and 15 under the NSW framework. Safe Work NSW has consolidated the list into broader categories, combining related hazards under broader headings so it's easier for operational use and compliance. The underlying obligations are identical.
Both frameworks require employers to identify, assess and control psychosocial risks, applying the same duty of care and the same hierarchy of controls used elsewhere in work health and safety.
The five hazards that surface most
1. High & low job demands
It's not the occasional late night or early morning. It's the constant, excessive workload that leads to fatigue, then anxiety, which can lead to depression and disengagement. The flip side is just as real: monotonous, repetitive, dull work that isn't stimulating. As Kelly put it, we give our dogs toys so they don't get bored, and it's the same with our workers. The fix is active: switch up tasks, check in, ask how things are going, and balance it so you're not giving them too much.
2. Bullying
Repeated unreasonable behaviour by a person or group toward someone at work. It can be intimidating, belittling or dehumanising. Managers set the tone here. Practical controls include setting very clear expectations of behaviour, a code of conduct that's lived rather than just a piece of paper, modelling respectful language, and containing the louder voices in a room so the quieter ones can speak up. Nip it in the bud early and deal with it immediately, not days or weeks later at an appraisal.
3. Poor organisational justice
It's really just about fairness, where rules aren't applied to everybody equally. One person makes a joke and gets away with it because "that's just who he is," while someone else saying the same thing would be deemed the bully. As Kelly said, the standard you're willing to accept is the standard you walk by. Keep policies and rules uniform, be transparent about why decisions are made, and create open feedback channels people feel psychologically safe to use.
4. Lack of support & the "buckets" problem
James Mattson's caution: as employers we try to put things in buckets, and we shouldn't assume there aren't other buckets we need to deal with. A shy worker who feels intimidated may not fit the bullying bucket from a legal perspective, but the environment may still create a risk to safety that falls into another bucket, like lack of support. Don't assume one label covers everything.
5. Role clarity, isolation & job insecurity
Unclear responsibilities, remote or isolated work, and uncertainty about one's future all carry psychosocial risk, particularly when they accumulate, as the case study shows.
Case study: Kevin
Kelly walked through an anonymised accepted claim that brings these hazards to life. Kevin had worked at a small-to-medium enterprise for around 15 years and was deeply committed to the community he served.
How the hazards accumulated
- High/low job control: went from operating at a national level to having duties stripped and every task checked by his manager.
- Bullying & scapegoating: deemed the sole perpetrator of a complaint despite significant evidence to the contrary, including the person who put the claim in saying it wasn't Kevin.
- Isolation: his team was directed to route all communication through his part-time assistant; he was told not to discuss the situation with anyone.
- Low, meaningless work: reduced to "tick-and-flick" tasks beneath his role.
- Job insecurity: no clarity on what his future held; when he asked, he was told to "just carry on" or call EAP.
This continued for almost 12 months, ultimately leaving Kevin off work and unwell for an extended period.
Kelly's reflection: she rarely sees psychological hazards presenting as a single neat issue. It's usually a cluster of problems, and the common thread is that it wasn't identified or addressed early enough.
Spotting the early warning signs
Two signals matter most when a worker isn't speaking up: behaviour change and organisational data.
- Behaviour change: cameras off in meetings, avoiding people, late-night or 3am emails, missed deadlines from someone previously diligent, withdrawal and disorganisation.
- Organisational data: rising sick leave and absenteeism, and heavy EAP usage. Kevin accessed more than 20 EAP sessions in less than 10 months, which on its own speaks to a problem and should prompt the question: what's happening for you that you need this level of service?
Building an organisational response
Good practice is proactive, not reactive. Recurring themes from the session:
Use evidence-based surveys to find your pain points. People at Work, the Copenhagen Psychosocial Questionnaire (COPSOQ), and Guarding Minds at Work all map onto the code framework.
Close the loop. Tell people what you've done or plan to do, and come back to them. Failure to close the loop is a major driver of ongoing insecurity and fear.
Don't rely solely on EAP. It's one control, not a substitute for managing and supporting people internally.
Train and support managers to recognise risk indicators, intervene early, listen actively, and have difficult conversations safely.
Know when to escalate. Bring in external support such as a mediator or workplace facilitator when an issue is beyond internal scope.
Keep it proportionate. Use the data to target real pain points rather than dropping an entire framework on everyone at once.
The legal lens & the workers' comp crossover
James Mattson covered how the new workers' compensation reforms, also commencing 1 July, interact with these obligations. Claims for psychological injury will turn on whether a relevant event caused that injury, and that event is one of four things: bullying, sexual harassment, racial harassment, or excessive work demands. Those issues are looked at through an industrial relations lens.
Reasonable management action remains a legitimate defence, now assessed in the broadest possible sense: was there management action, and was that action reasonable? Importantly, even where the commission finds no compensation is payable, that won't absolve an employer of its work health and safety duties. A worker may say they were bullied during performance management and the commission might find it was reasonable management action, but the employer still needs to provide a safe workplace moving forward. It's just that there won't be compensation.
He also advised pulling disparate plans and policies, such as a bullying policy or a sexual harassment policy, into a single, coherent master psychosocial plan of all the hazards and the measures to control them. The first thing Safe Work will ask is: where are the documents? Where's the plan? Where's the risk assessment? Where's the measures? Where's the safe work procedure?
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