Health and Safety Consultation in Australia: What Small Businesses Must Do

If you run a small business in Australia, you're almost certainly already consulting your workers about safety - even if you've never called it that. The morning toolbox talk. The quick check before a tricky job. The conversation after a near-miss. All of it is consultation, and it's one of the most important duties under Australian WHS law.

The bit that catches most small businesses out isn't the talking. It's the documenting.

Under section 47 of the Work Health and Safety Act, every PCBU (Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking - basically, anyone running a business) has to consult with workers on health and safety matters, so far as is reasonably practicable. It's a specific legal duty, but it's also one of the easier ones to get right once you know what counts.

Here's the short version of what the law says, who it applies to, and how to make the consultation you're already doing visible and defensible.

What "consultation" looks like under the WHS Act

Most business owners have an instinctive sense of what consultation means: ask workers what they think, share information, listen, decide. That intuition is basically right - and section 48 of the WHS Act spells out what consultation must involve:

1. Share information. Relevant health and safety information has to be shared with workers - not held back at the manager's level.

2. Give workers a real opportunity to express their views. A genuine chance to raise issues and contribute, not a tick-the-box "any concerns?"

3. Take those views into account. Worker input has to actually inform your decision. You don't have to agree with it, but you have to consider it before deciding.

4. Advise workers of the outcome. In a timely way. They need to know what was decided and why.

Section 48 also says that if workers are represented by a Health and Safety Representative (HSR), the consultation must involve that representative. The HSR isn't an optional channel - they're part of how consultation has to happen for the workers they represent.

When does it apply? Whenever you're:

• Identifying hazards or assessing risks

• Deciding how to eliminate or control risks

• Proposing changes that affect health or safety

• Making decisions about facilities for worker welfare

• Proposing procedures for resolving WHS issues, consulting workers, or monitoring conditions

If a worker could be affected, consultation needs to happen before the decision is made - not after.

Who counts as a "worker"?

This is one of the bits worth knowing about, because "worker" under the Model WHS Act is broader than "employee." It includes:

• Direct employees (permanent, part-time, casual)

• Contractors and subcontractors

• Labour hire workers

• Apprentices and trainees

• Work experience students and interns

• Volunteers

If they carry out work for your business and could be affected by a WHS matter, your consultation duty extends to them. It's also worth knowing the duty doesn't transfer - you can't pass it onto a head contractor or a labour hire agency just because you're not the direct employer.

(A quick caveat: Victoria has different terminology and a narrower scope - covered in its own section below.)

Why it's worth getting right

The most underrated reason to do this well is also the most practical: workers see hazards that bosses don't. The forklift driver knows where the floor lifts. The cleaner knows which chemical the new starter can't read the label on. The apprentice knows which step in the process feels rushed. Consultation is how that information gets out of their heads and into a place where it can be acted on.

The second reason is legal. A contravention of section 47 carries a maximum penalty (tier C) under the Model WHS Act of around $32,000 for an individual and $159,000 for a body corporate, as at 1 July 2025. State figures sit in a similar range and are expressed differently in each jurisdiction - NSW, for example, sets the same penalty as 243 and 1,214 penalty units, which works out to about $30,000 and $150,000. Amounts are reindexed annually.

If a regulator investigates an incident, one of the first questions they'll ask is what consultation happened about the risk that caused it. A documented process - meetings, records, decisions - puts you in a strong position to answer. Without one, the case is harder to make, regardless of what conversations actually happened.

A point worth being precise about: section 47/48 doesn't, by itself, require you to keep a written record of every consultation. The legal duty is to consult, in the way section 48 describes. But documentation is how you demonstrate that consultation took place - and in practice, that's what audits, investigations, and tender pre-qualifications run on.

A note for Victoria

If your business is in Victoria, you're under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 rather than the Model WHS Act. The consultation duty still applies - it's in sections 35 to 37 of the Vic OHS Act - but the scope is narrower than under the harmonised WHS framework.

In Victoria, the duty to consult is owed to employees. It also extends to independent contractors and their employees in respect of matters over which the employer has control. Volunteers aren't covered by the Victorian consultation duty in the same way they are under the Model WHS Act - though employers still have broader duties to make sure volunteers aren't exposed to safety risks from the workplace.

The practical advice below applies in Victoria too - just adjust who you're consulting with accordingly.

"But we're small - does this really apply to us?"

Yes - and the good news is, the smaller you are, the simpler the arrangements can be. WHS consultation applies to every business with workers, including sole traders who engage contractors or labour hire. The size of the business affects how you consult, not whether you have to. A two-person operation can do this with a 10-minute meeting once a month. A 30-person workshop probably needs a bit more structure. The duty is the same; the format flexes.

Three things that take this from "we talk about safety" to a documented process

If your consultation arrangements are mostly informal, here's where to start. None of this is heavy lifting.

1. Choose a consultation arrangement that fits your business.

For most small operations, the simplest workable arrangement is:

• A regular safety meeting - monthly is a sensible cadence - plus a meeting after any significant incident or change

• An open process for workers to raise hazards day to day (a hazard report form, a designated point of contact, or both)

If a worker requests a Health and Safety Representative, you have to start the work-group and election process the Act sets out. That includes negotiating a work group and taking reasonable steps to do so within 14 days of the request, before facilitating the actual election. Larger teams may also choose to establish a Health and Safety Committee.

2. Write down how consultation happens.

A documented consultation procedure is the bit that turns informal consultation into something defensible. It should cover: when meetings happen, who attends, how hazards get reported and reviewed, how worker feedback gets considered, and how outcomes get communicated back.

It doesn't need to be long. It needs to be clear.

3. Keep simple records.

Section 47/48 doesn't strictly require a written record of every consultation - but in practice, a short meeting note (date, attendees, what was discussed, what was decided) is the only way you'll be able to demonstrate consultation actually happened. Same goes for hazard reports and how they were resolved. Five minutes after the meeting and you've got a record that holds up under scrutiny.

How this fits in a WHS Manual

A documented WHS Management System pulls all of this together. The consultation procedure sits inside it, along with the meeting templates, hazard report forms, and the records you generate over time. It's the difference between consultation that happens in your head and consultation that can be shown, audited, and improved.

If your current WHS manual doesn't include a written consultation procedure, that's a useful gap to fill - and probably the easiest one on the list to close in a single afternoon.

Grab the free template

We've put together a free Record of WHS/OHS Meetings template you can start using today. It's the simple meeting record we'd recommend for any small business. Fill it in after each safety meeting and you've got a defensible record of consultation.

Download it free here →

Or get the full system

Our WHS Management Systems are built by WHS specialists for small Australian businesses. They include a documented consultation procedure, all the forms and records you need, and everything else aligned to Australian WHS regulations. One-off price, no subscription, fully editable.

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