Risk! Engineers Talk Governance

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In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss Culture, Criticality and Controls in terms of Ethics and Quality Assurance. 
Starting from Thomas Kuhn’s idea of paradigm shifts, they look at why Australia’s defence exports are largely defensive and how that protective instinct is reflected in WHS legislation. 
They also cover how splitting the world into narrow domains weakens decision-making, why the order of project success criteria changes stakeholder thinking, and why quality assurance is needed to confirm the controls actually work. 
If you’d like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we’d love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au. For further information on Richard and Gaye’s consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find their booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of their latest news and events.
Summary notes
00:41 – The three Cs: culture, criticality, controls
00:56 – Paradigms and Kuhn’s generational change
02:33 – Australia’s defensive defence exports
05:15 – WHS intent and the protective culture
06:19 – Siloed domains and due diligence
09:15 – Budget as the last success criterion
09:59 – Quality assurance: did controls work?
11:16 – Compulsory voting and embracing culture

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In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss co-operation versus competition policy in project due diligence. 
Drawing on the postgraduate course they teach at Swinburne University, they explain why projects so often go wrong; that being the objective was never clearly articulated, or foreseeable problems were never built into it. They look at how trust, transparency and having the right people in the room let clients and contractors share risk instead of fighting over it, and what is lost when corporate memory walks out the door. 
If you’d like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we’d love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au. 
For further information on R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of our latest news and events.
Timestamps
00:35 – Co-operation versus competition in projects
00:53 – Swinburne project due diligence course
01:16 – Why projects go wrong
03:58 – Trust as the basis of co-operation
05:07 – Right people in the room
06:00 – Trust-based builder example
09:45 – Corporate memory loss
11:30 – Transparency and shared protection
12:51 – Criticality and control: designing out risk

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In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss where AI can be used in Work Health and Safety (WHS/OHS). 
They look at where it is likely to go rather than where it is now, including AI as a watchdog for control rooms and marine pilotage, and why small, locally run models may suit confidential client data better than cloud tools. They also cover AI in safe systems of work, who is accountable when AI informs board decisions, and why a convincing answer is not necessarily a correct one.
If you’d like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we’d love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au. For further information on Richard and Gaye’s consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you’ll also find their booklets (store) and a sign-up for their quarterly newsletter to keep informed of their latest news and events.

Show notes:
00:33 – Where AI is used in work health and safety
01:04 – AI as a watchdog: alarms, rail and ports
02:36 – Local small language models and data confidentiality
03:21 – Marine pilotage: a second set of eyes
07:42 – AI in SOPs and safe systems of work
09:26 – Accountability for AI-informed board decisions
10:28 – Why convincing answers aren’t always correct
12:00 – Why engineers need to keep up with AI

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In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss Hazard and Risk versus Threat and Vulnerability – Top Down, Bottom Up. 
The podcast discussion includes:
How bottom-up techniques are creeping back into risk assessments, even though WHS legislation focuses on criticality and asks what is reasonable in the circumstances, 
How prosecutions are shaping what "critical" means in practice, 
Why cutting minor-incident rates doesn't remove fatality risk, and 
Why the two methodologies each have a place if used at the right time. 
If you'd like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we'd love to hear from you: email admin@r2a.com.au. 
For further information on Richard and Gaye's consulting work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au, where you'll also find booklets (store) and a newsletter sign-up to keep informed of their latest news and events.
Timestamps
00:34 – Why revisit hazard and risk versus threat and vulnerability: a drift back to bottom-up techniques despite the WHS focus on criticality
01:13 – Prosecution patterns in Australia: SFAIRP is hard to prosecute, smaller organisations and repeat or multiple-fatality events get targeted
03:26 – WHS Codes of Practice are written around single-fatality hazards such as working at heights, and the language confusion that follows
04:03 – Bird and Heinrich's triangle, and the elimination of fatalities task force in underground mining
06:29 – WHS asks what controls are practicable and reasonable, not whether the risk is bad enough to act
07:18 – Hazard and risk as middle-management, bottom-up measures versus threat and vulnerability as national-interest, top-down thinking (the desalination plant and defence examples)
08:30 – Criticality in two bands: single or multiple fatalities versus rare mass-casualty events
09:16 – How major events change policy, and the New Zealand experience including the Port of Auckland prosecution
10:27 – Differing state approaches and the pending Safe Work Australia review
10:49 – Wrap-up: both methodologies have insight, so use each in the right place at the right time

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In this episode of Risk! Engineers Talk Governance, due diligence engineers Richard Robinson and Gaye Francis discuss New Zealand's Health and Safety at Work Amendment Bill, which received Royal Assent on 9 July and commences 1 April 2027. 
They unpack the shift towards a focus on critical risks for small business and an expanded role for approved codes of practice, and question whether this makes the regime more prescriptive than the "reasonably practicable" standard intended. The conversation moves to a Wellington waterfront fatality case and the accountability questions it raises for local councils and their executives.
If you'd like us to cover a specific topic or have any feedback we'd love to hear from you. Email admin@r2a.com.au. For further information on Richard and Gaye's work with R2A, head to https://www.r2a.com.au.
Timestamps:
00:00 – Introduction
00:40 – NZ Health and Safety at Work Amendment Bill receives Royal Assent (9 July), effect from 1 April 2027
01:23 – Speed of the Bill through NZ Parliament compared to Australia
01:53 – Key changes: focus on critical events for small business; expanded role of approved codes of practice
02:34 – Tension between codes of practice as a "minimum standard" and the "reasonably practicable" objective
03:16 – R2A's process for testing and documenting what's reasonable in the circumstances
04:36 – Richard's two closing workshop questions, and using AI as a "watchdog" for critical issues
05:16 – Richard's experiment running local AI models on Mac hardware
06:15 – Controls evolve even when critical issues don't; AI as a possible future control or QA system
06:56 – Port automation, wearable tracking tech, and phone-based hazard alerts
08:04 – Recap: NZ's shift to criticality focus and increased use of codes of practice
08:38 – Port of Auckland CEO Tony Gibson prosecution and its link to the new amendment
09:13 – Case study: Wellington waterfront fatality (referred by NZ associate Frank Stocks)
09:41 – Details of the incident and the coronial inquiry
10:40 – Prior fatality two years earlier (Sandy Calkin) and unimplemented lighting/edge-protection recommendations
11:08 – Criticism of Wellington council for rejecting the recommendations
12:04 – Who bears liability — councillors vs council executive
12:50 – Parallel with Owners Corporation committees and volunteer liability in Australia
14:15 – Debate: should businesses be expected to know all their hazards?
14:49 – Prescriptive vs "reasonably practicable" regimes, and why WA delayed its own WHS Act
15:44 – Will Australia follow New Zealand's more prescriptive approach?
17:04 – Which legislation will apply if the Wellington case proceeds to prosecution
17:36 – Close