Report unsafe work at Commonwealth workplaces: Comcare

Start on site

Start by telling the workplace where you can. A Commonwealth agency has its own reporting process and health and safety representatives. A concern that has already been raised there is easier for a regulator to act on. Keep a note of who you told and when.

Going to Comcare

Comcare’s contact page says a worker or member of the public can inform it of a work health and safety concern. It also gives a response time. Comcare inspectors can also act on a complaint or allegation, and an inspection can be triggered that way. We haven’t yet checked Comcare’s pages for this guide, so the table below stays empty until those checks pass. Until then, the contact page and the inspections page in the sources are the places to read the regulator’s own wording.

Your name and what happens to it

We haven’t checked what Comcare says about names or confidentiality, so this page makes no claim. Ask Comcare before you send a report whether it allows an anonymous one and what that does to follow-up. Until you’ve read Comcare’s answer, don’t assume a report can’t be traced back to you.

When someone has been hurt

If someone has died or been seriously hurt, that is a notifiable incident rather than a concern, and the Commonwealth notifiable incidents page covers it. Before anything else, check which regulator applies to your workplace, since most sites are state-regulated.

Where Haznote fits

Haznote names the regulator from the site’s state, so for a Commonwealth workplace you check for yourself that Comcare covers it. It doesn’t contact Comcare. Anonymous reports are a site setting, off by default and best-effort.