This Code of Practice on managing the risks of respirable crystalline silica from engineered stone in the workplace (hereafter referred to as the Code) is an approved code of practice under section 274 of the Work Health and Safety Act (the WHS Act).

An approved code of practice provides practical guidance on how to achieve the standards of work health and safety required under the WHS Act and the Work Health and Safety Regulation (the WHS Regulation) and effective ways to identify and manage risks.

A code of practice can assist anyone who has a duty of care in the circumstances described in the code of practice to achieve compliance with the health and safety duties in the WHS Act and WHS Regulation, in relation to the subject matter of the code of practice. Like regulations, codes of practice deal with particular issues and may not cover all hazards or risks in the workplace. The health and safety duties require duty holders to consider all risks associated with work, not only those for which regulations and codes of practice exist.

Codes of practice are admissible in court proceedings under the WHS Act and WHS Regulation. Courts may regard a code of practice as evidence of what is known about a hazard, risk, risk assessment or risk control and may rely on the code in determining what is reasonably practicable in the circumstances to which the code of practice relates. For further information see the Interpretive Guideline: The meaning of ‘reasonably practicable’ on Safe Work Australia’s website.

Compliance with the WHS Act and WHS Regulation may be achieved by following another method if it provides an equivalent or higher standard of work health and safety than the code of practice.

An inspector may refer to an approved code of practice when issuing an improvement or prohibition notice.

In circumstances where equipment, or methods, for managing work health and safety (WHS) risks are used in the workplace, it is recommended that current Australian standards or recognised international standards are applied, where available.

Scope and application:

This Code is intended to be used by a range of duty holders to assist them in complying with the WHS Act and WHS Regulation. Duty holders include persons conducting a business or undertaking (PCBUs), workers and their health and safety representatives (HSR), manufacturers, importers and suppliers. It provides practical guidance on how to effectively manage risks associated with working with engineered stone and, subsequently, minimise the incidence of respirable crystalline silica related diseases, such as silicosis.

This Code provides guidance through the lifecycle of an engineered stone product including fabrication, installation, maintenance, removal and disposal.

Working with engineered stone carries a range of risks beyond those covered in this Code, such as manual handling. SafeWork NSW has published other relevant Codes of Practice to help manage these risks including:

− Managing the work environment and facilities
− Construction work, and
− Hazardous manual tasks.