Note: This information is intended as general guidance only and does not constitute legal advice. We encourage you to obtain independent advice about your legal obligations. If you have any feedback on the information provided, please contact us at info@nhvr.gov.au

This regulatory advice is relevant to all businesses whose employees undertake work or activities that can impact the safety of any heavy vehicle, including operational and administrative staff. This advice provides guidance on how Human Factors and organisational performance impact a worker’s fitness to work and provides examples to assist businesses in implementing reasonable interventions to assess and verify worker fitness.

Who is this advice for?

This regulatory advice provides guidance for:

• parties in the Chain of Responsibility (CoR).

What are my legal obligations?

This is an obligation to eliminate or minimise public risks, and a prohibition against directly or indirectly causing or encouraging a driver or another person, including a party in the CoR, to contravene the HVNL. CoR parties and their executives, should be aware that they remain a CoR party even when their transport activities are contracted, or subcontracted, to another party.

What are the legal consequences?

If your business is a party in the CoR and it fails to eliminate or minimise public risks so far as is reasonably practicable, then it may be in breach of its primary duty. If a court finds an individual or a company and/or its executives guilty of an offence it may impose penalties ranging from education and improvement notices to financial penalties and/or imprisonment. 

It is important to understand that the primary duty is based on a positive duty to ensure safety. This means that a CoR party can be prosecuted for a primary duty breach if that party does not take proactive steps to perform its duty, even if no incident or crash occurs.

What is fitness to work and why is it important to my business?

Fitness to work means a worker is physically, mentally and emotionally able to carry out their work in a manner that does not endanger the health and safety of themselves or others. Being fit to work is much more than not being impaired by fatigue or by alcohol or other drugs. When considering if someone is fit to work you need to consider their behaviour, knowledge, experience, training, safety awareness, and their mental and physical wellbeing.

Unfit workers present a significant safety risk to themselves, other workers, and the public, and can impact the safety of a business’s transport activities. The HVNL primary duty requires CoR parties to eliminate public risk and where this is not possible, minimise the risk so far as is reasonably practicable. It is essential that every individual is fit to safely carry out their duties when they sign on to work and remains fit throughout the duration of their shift.

Note: Being fit to work is essential for all workers not just those operating machinery or heavy vehicles. This is because there are many roles within a business that may impact safety. For example, if a manager or scheduler is fatigued, distracted, or affected by alcohol or other drugs, they may make poor decisions, such as allocating a worker to a vehicle combination that they are not experienced in operating, introducing safety risks and increasing the potential for injury or harm.

Fitness to work and Human Factors

Human Factors also greatly affect fitness to work. This advice highlights hazards resulting from Human Factors that may be present when engaging in transport activities and provides examples of reasonable interventions for CoR parties to assess and verify worker fitness. What is a reasonable level of intervention will differ depending on the type and extent of hazards and the individual business operations.

Understanding Human Factors and considering how human performance impacts fitness to work can also have a positive effect on your business operations. Optimally performing humans supported by good working systems will make fewer errors and will be better equipped to recover from errors if they do occur. This results in a safer workplace and greater efficiency and productivity.

Human Factors and human performance

The NHVR’s Human Factors Policy (PDF, 202KB) describes Human Factors as the application of what we know about people which can influence human performance. It includes a range of elements such as abilities, characteristics, and limitations that contribute to actions and decisions.

Human performance is how people carry out tasks. It includes individual actions and collective behaviours that impact safety, including both how a person manages risks and responds to errors, and how someone’s actions can be a source of risk.

Human Factors have a significant impact on all parts of business operations including hazards, risk perception, decision making and situational awareness. All these things impact safety. Understanding the way Human Factors influence human performance and impact a person’s fitness to work is an integral part of ensuring the safety of your transport activities.

In the simplest terms, Human Factors are all about how the body and mind work when undertaking a task. Examples of Human Factors that impact human performance relating to fitness to work include:

• Stress.
• Fatigue.
• Alcohol and other drugs.
• Physical health.
• Mental and psychological wellbeing.
• Distraction.
• Competency/ proficiency.

Elements that contribute to Human Factors

There are a range of characteristics and situations that contribute to the kinds of Human Factors that affect human performance.

Stress

Stress can lead to impaired decision-making, reduced memory, and disrupted sleep. Examples that contribute to stress include:

• Changes in personal circumstances. For example, a new baby at home, illness, death in the family, or other personal issues.
• Financial stress.
• Work-related stress.

Fatigue

Fatigue reduces cognitive function, reaction time, and physical endurance hindering effective performance. Examples that contribute to fatigue impairment include:

• Interrupted sleep.
• Shift work.
• Returning to work following annual leave or sick leave. For example, workers may take time to readjust into shift work/ night work.
• Changes to work type or duties or increased workload. For example, workers may take time to adjust from office work to operational tasks or from short haul driving work with multiple drop offs to long haul or multi day trips.
• Secondary employment or volunteering that requires substantial time commitment such as volunteer work with emergency services or other community commitments.

More information can be found in Regulatory Advice – Fitness to drive: Fatigue and Fatigue management. 

Alcohol and other drugs

Improper use of alcohol and other drugs compromises cognitive and physical abilities including judgment, coordination, and alertness, significantly affecting human performance and safety. Examples that contribute to alcohol and other drug impairment include:

• Alcohol consumption prior to work resulting in the worker having alcohol in their system when attending for work that impacts their ability to safely carry out their duties.
• Use of illicit substances resulting in impairment and inability to work safely.
• Prescription medication that may cause impairment, such as drowsiness. When being prescribed medication workers should have a discussion with their medical practitioner about their job requirements and any possible side effects that may prevent them from operating machinery, impact driving, or otherwise effect their fitness to work. Some prescription medications when used inappropriately, can also cause impairment.

More information can be found in Regulatory Advice - Managing the risks of employees impaired by alcohol and other drugs. 

Physical health

Good physical health enhances energy levels, stamina, and resilience, supporting optimal performance. Examples that contribute to physical health impairment include:

• A head cold making the worker sluggish.
• Physical pain or impairment.
• Pre-existing health conditions that can impair a worker’s ability to complete their work safely. For example, musculoskeletal injuries such as back issues.

More information can be found in Regulatory Advice – Fitness to drive: Physical health

Mental wellbeing and psychological

Mental health issues affect focus, emotional stability, and decision-making under pressure which impacts human performance. Examples that contribute to mental wellbeing and psychological impairment include:

• Mental illness such as anxiety or depression, affecting decision making and risk appetite.
• Psychosocial hazards. For example, bullying or harassment, low job control, poor support, remote or isolated work, or poor organisational culture.

More information can be found in Regulatory Advice – Fitness to drive: Mental health.

Distraction

Distractions interrupt attention, increasing errors and reducing situational awareness. Examples that contribute to distraction include:

• Workers disengaged from the task or disinterested in their work
• Low attention spans or becoming distracted.
• Mobile phone use whilst driving or at other inappropriate or unsafe times.
• Music, podcasts, or other forms of audio that divert attention from the task at hand.
• Conversations with other workers or passengers whilst driving or at other times that will impact ability to concentrate on the task at hand.

More information can be found in Regulatory Advice – Driver distraction. 

Competency/proficiency

Having adequate skills and training ensures better skill application, confidence, and the ability to perform tasks safely and effectively. Examples that may indicate a worker is not competent and proficient include:

• Inexperienced workers. This includes otherwise experienced workers who are unfamiliar with a specific task, new workers who are not familiar with the industry or are new to the business, and workers who are asked to complete tasks above their skill level.
• Poor work history, driving, or compliance record. For example, a worker failing to comply with company policies or a driver with multiple speeding or distraction events recorded, or a manager or worker who struggles to communicate and engage with colleagues.
• Ineffective or incomplete training. For example, workers may have undertaken some training but are not yet deemed competent or have limited experience relating to a specific task, vehicle combination or load type.
• The introduction of new equipment or processes into the workplace without proper training and/or supervision or without formal procedures.

The above are some examples of common Human Factors that impact fitness to work and can increase risk. Managing the risks associated with these factors is especially important when undertaking heavy vehicle transport activities. To ensure safety and meet their primary duty, businesses need to consider Human Factors when undertaking risk assessments.

More information can be found in Regulatory Advice - Managing the risks of undertrained workers.

Note: The above links focus predominantly on heavy vehicle drivers. However, the information also applies to workers generally.

What are the Human Factors risks?

Human Factors risks are inevitable and cannot be eliminated entirely when humans are involved in your business operations. The HVNL primary duty requires CoR parties to eliminate public risk and where this is not possible minimise the risk so far as is reasonably practicable. Therefore, how human performance impacts safety outcomes must be considered when assessing risk and implementing controls. This includes the specific consideration of each person’s physical, mental and emotional state along with their operational experience, skills and knowledge, and their familiarity with the relevant task.

The potential risks resulting from Human Factors hazards that impact human performance include:

• serious psychological or physical injury or death to workers and others
• damage to infrastructure
• damage to the environment
• financial risks because of disruption to business operations
• reputational damage
• risk of legal prosecution.

How can my business manage these hazards and risks?

Human Factors need to be considered when developing Safety Management Systems. Human Factors need to be considered both when determining risks and when implementing controls. A risk matrix can also be a helpful tool to determine where risk management resources should be prioritised.

Part of organisational culture should include remaining vigilant in your approach to fitness to work. Ensuring workers feel empowered to notify supervisors if they are unfit to work without fear of repercussion should be central to business operations. Workers should be made aware of their own responsibilities in managing their personal fitness to work and resources available to them and be encouraged and supported to speak up if they are uncomfortable or concerned about performing an assigned task for any reason.

Fitness to work should be a daily and ongoing conversation within the workplace and should remain a priority and front of mind for workers, supervisors, and managers. All staff should be trained in how to identify signs that a colleague may not be fit to safely carry out their duties.

Providing workers with robust and ongoing training relevant to their job responsibilities will ensure that they are both comfortable and competent in carrying out their duties.

You can also implement a range of wellbeing protocols and opportunities to encourage better fitness to work. For example, providing workers access to Employee Assistance Programs to seek free and confidential counselling. Providing access to subsidised or discounted health clubs such as gyms can have a positive impact on an individual’s physical and mental health.

For more information, see Safety Risk Management.

Examples of reasonable interventions to assess and verify fitness to work

There are several opportunities for a business to assess and verify an individual’s fitness to work. These include during the recruitment process, as part of sign on procedures, before, during or at the end of a shift.

Examples of interventions available to assist businesses include:

Pre-employment background checks

Prior to engaging a worker, you should undertake rigorous screening processes to ensure suitability to carry out necessary duties and that a potential candidate’s values align with organisational values. This is particularly important for roles that are more hazardous such as operational roles performing hazardous manual handling, loading and unloading, operating heavy vehicles and machinery and working with and around dangerous goods. Screening may include:

• multiple interviews including face-to-face
• skills assessments to verify capability and identify where further training may be needed
• assessments to better understand cognitive ability and candidate suitability
• medical/ physical screening to identify if workers may need additional support or reasonable adjustments made to ensure they can safely and effectively carry out their duties
• thorough reference checks including requesting references from supervisors and customers
• police and criminal history checks
• social media checks and internet searches
• licence, driving record and qualification checks.

Onboarding

All new workers should be inducted into the business’s policies and procedures including fitness to work and broader work health and safety policies and procedures.

A robust induction process will provide new workers with a good knowledge base to carry out their duties and a point of contact should further information or clarification be required.

Fitness to work policies

Fitness to work policies should be robust and outline the process for workers to inform the business or their managers when they are not fit to work for any reason. There may be different policies/ processes and classes of leave depending on the reason a worker isn’t fit to work. For example, your business may provide additional leave days for mental health and fatigue.

Alternative or reduced duties

Alternative or reduced duties may be reasonable in circumstances where a worker is not fit to carry out their usual duties or cannot perform at normal levels of productivity but could still safely and effectively work in an alternative position with different duties, at a reduced pace or level of productivity, or with other additional supports.

Cognitive assessments

Cognitive assessments can be used to verify that a worker is presenting fit to carry out their duties at a point in time. These may be more formal such as the worker having to complete a puzzle at sign-on, or informal through an interaction at sign-on or during a shift. Understanding the visual and verbal cues that may indicate that a person is unfit to work supports decision-making about appropriate interventions and controls required to manage the risk. Signs may include:

• excessive yawning and sleepiness
• short-term memory problems
• difficulty concentrating
• failing to engage in conversations
• poor decision-making and judgment
• reduced coordination or slower-than-normal reflexes
• slurred speech
• glassy eyes
• behaving out of character such as being very loud when the person is usually quieter and more reserved.

Training and awareness sessions

Regular training and awareness sessions should be held to ensure that everyone remains up to date with the latest equipment, policies and procedures, and safety risk management strategies. Even the most experienced workers will benefit from ongoing training.

Note: Training should also include assessments to verify competency. This is particularly important for operational components.

Alcohol and other drug screening

Providing information and awareness sessions on the hazards of the improper use of alcohol and other drugs as well as administering regular alcohol and other drug screening are good preventative measures that assist in discouraging workers from presenting to work impaired by alcohol and other drugs. Alcohol and other drug screening may be undertaken at pre-employment, at random, after an incident, or for cause testing.

Health surveillance

Businesses that expose workers to high-risk chemicals or substances or, excessive noise or vibration should incorporate health monitoring programs into their operations. You need to be aware of the acceptable exposure standards and requirements for monitoring frequency.

Some transport activities associated with the use of heavy vehicles expose workers to a higher risk of mental health issues. Businesses should remain vigilant in supporting all workers mental health.

Secondary employment declarations

It is important to be aware of any paid or voluntary secondary work that may impact on fitness to work. Significant additional hours of work either paid or unpaid can contribute to fatigue.

Medical assessments

Pre-employment medical assessments can be implemented to identify pre-existing health conditions and better understand workers physical capabilities and needs. Some workers may need additional support or reasonable adjustments made to ensure they can safely and effectively carry out their duties.

Note: Some state and territory jurisdictions require heavy vehicle drivers pass a Fitness to Drive Medical Assessment prior to commencing employment and then periodically as prescribed. More information on national driver medical standards can be found here: Assessing Fitness to Drive | Austroads.

Fatigue and Distraction Detection Technology (FDDT)

Fatigue and Distraction Detection Technologies detect possible fatigue and distraction events. They are one part of a solution to alert businesses when drivers are fatigued or distracted.

Note: It is important that businesses understand that FDDT’s are not a complete solution to ensuring drivers are fit. FDDT alerts are an indication that the driver has already experienced a fatigue or distraction event. FDDT’s are a last line of defence and should not be solely relied upon to determine driver fitness or manage the safety of transport activities.

More information on FDDT’s can be found here: Fatigue Distraction Detection Technologies

Information on Heavy vehicle safety technology and telematics can be found here: Regulatory Advice – Heavy vehicle safety technology and telematics.

Welfare checks throughout the shift

You can undertake welfare checks at random; however, prioritising higher-risk workers may be a more effective use of a business’s limited resources. For example:

• workers returning from a period of annual leave or medical leave
• drivers undertaking a new driving task such as a change from local work to long-haul
• workers that have recently experienced fatigue or distraction events
• workers undertaking duties that pose a higher risk of fitness to work deterioration such as performing tasks that require high levels of concentration, undertaking repetitive monotonous tasks or operating in extreme heat or cold
• workers who have been showing symptoms of illness such as coming down with a cold
• workers that are experiencing additional or abnormal stress in their family or personal life
• workers acting out of character whose behaviour and attitude have noticeably changed
• workers taking unexpected, excessive or unscheduled leave.

Responding to third party observations

Changes in behaviour are often a sign that a person is feeling fatigued or has other challenges in their life that may impact their fitness to work. Third party or stakeholder feedback and colleague’s observations regarding a worker’s behaviour can assist in understanding an individual’s fitness to work and identifying if they may need additional support.

Determining the level of intervention needed for activities/risks

The most complex part of assessing and verifying fitness to work can be determining where to concentrate intervention resources. Including each Human Factor that is present for a particular activity or journey in your risk assessment will help determine the level of overall risk for a task. Higher risk workers, human factors, journeys and loads can then be identified and additional resources applied to verify worker fitness. For example, those journeys or employees that have escalated risk levels or Human Factors might need additional interventions throughout a shift.

Scenarios

Low or no intervention needed

A worker who has been with the company for several years, displays healthy physical and mental wellbeing, has a known medical history and a good safety and employment record, good relationships with their colleagues and managers and is undertaking duties they are familiar with and proficiently trained to undertake, working a continuous roster (i.e. not shift work) is unlikely to need any interventions during their shift. So long as the worker is empowered to notify the business if they are unfit to work you can rely on what is known about the worker and the task and feel confident that they are fit to work and only require minimal intervention or supervision.

Intervention needed

A worker who is new to the industry, and may work for multiple businesses, has pre-existing health issues or is experiencing mental stress in their work or personal lives will need additional resources dedicated to verifying they are fit to work and remain fit for the duration of their shift. This will likely be a combination of interventions such as increased supervision, cognitive assessments at sign-on, welfare checks during the shift, and providing leave or other support. However, the best combination of interventions will depend on the circumstance, individual person, and your business’s resources. 

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Resources

Master Code

Guidance and direction on how to effectively introduce a risk management process within your business can be found in Section 3 of the Master Code.

Safety Management System (SMS)

Management of safety risks can be more effective with the adoption, development and active use of an SMS.

An SMS is a systematic approach to managing safety – including the necessary organisational structures, accountabilities, policies and procedures – which is integrated throughout the business wherever possible.

An SMS can help you:

• provide a safer work environment for your employees, customers, contractors and the public
• manage your safety duties under the HVNL
• demonstrate your ability to manage risk and ensure safety
• become an employer of choice and preferred supplier to customers
• make informed decisions and increase efficiency
• allocate resources to the most critical areas that have an impact on safety
• reduce costs associated with incidents and accidents.

Regardless of the size of your business, an effective SMS can help you have an appropriate safety focus and comply with your duty to ensure the safety of your transport activities, so far as is reasonably practicable.

Targeted guidance, tools and information about the development and implementation of an SMS is available in the 9 Step SMS Roadmap.

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Understand the HVNL and your primary duty

Under the HVNL section 26C, each party in the CoR has a primary duty to ensure the safety of its transport activities, so far as is reasonably practicable. This duty includes an obligation to eliminate or minimise public risks and a prohibition against directly or indirectly causing or encouraging a driver or another person, including a party in the CoR, to contravene the HVNL.

Transport activities

Transport activities include all the activities associated with the use of a heavy vehicle on a road. These activities include safety systems, business processes, such as contract negotiation, communication and decision-making, as well as the activities normally associated with the transport and logistics sector, such as training, scheduling, route planning, managing premises, selecting and maintaining vehicles, packing, and loading.

So far as is reasonably practicable

So far as is ‘reasonably practicable’ means an action that can reasonably be done in relation to the duty, considering relevant matters such as:

• the likelihood of a safety risk or damage to road infrastructure
• the harm that could result from the risk or damage
• what the person knows, or ought reasonably to know, about the risk or damage
• what the person knows, or ought reasonably to know, about the ways of removing or minimising the risk, or preventing or minimising the damage
• the availability and suitability of those ways
• the cost associated with the available ways, including whether the cost is grossly disproportionate to the likelihood of the risk or damage.

More information can be found in Regulatory Advice - Reasonably practicable.

Executives of businesses that are parties in the CoR have a distinct duty under the HVNL section 26D HVNL to exercise due diligence to ensure the business complies with its duty to ensure the safety of its transport activities.

Due diligence

Exercising due diligence includes taking reasonable steps to:

• acquire and maintain knowledge about conducting transport activities safely
• understand the nature of the business’s transport activities, including the hazards and risks associated with those activities
• ensure the business has, and uses, appropriate resources to eliminate or minimise the hazards and risks associated with its transport activities
• ensure the business has, and uses, processes to eliminate or minimise the hazards and risks associated with its transport activities, and that information about hazards, risks and incidents is received, considered and responded to in a timely way.

Examples of executive due diligence activities include:

• collecting information about incident rates to see if the safety management plan is working
• participating in industry-led forums and safety seminars
• ensuring work procedures are being followed and result in improvements in safety
• ensuring safety incidents are responded to and investigated
• implementing learnings from the investigation of safety incidents.

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