WHS Obligations for Trade Businesses in Australia

SafeWork NSW handed out over $600,000 in fines in a single month this year. One fall-from-height incident cost a carpentry business $120,000. If you run a trade business in Australia — even if it's just you — you have legal safety duties, and the regulators are actively enforcing them.

What is a PCBU and why does it matter?

PCBU stands for Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking. If you have an ABN and do trade work, you're one. It is the legal entity that carries the primary duty of care under the Work Health and Safety Act. You cannot delegate this duty away — not to a safety officer, not to a subcontractor, not to an insurance policy. It sits with you personally.

Your core duties in plain English

• Safe work environment — safe premises, maintained tools, sensible systems of work. If a grinder guard is missing, that's on you.
• Identify hazards, manage risks — spot what could hurt someone, assess severity, put controls in place, and review regularly. Write it down.
• Consult with workers — if a safety decision affects your team (including subbies on site), you must genuinely consult them. "I told them" is not consultation.
• Training and supervision — inductions for every site, role-specific training, and enough supervision that a new starter doesn't get hurt figuring things out.
• PPE — provide and maintain the right personal protective equipment. Hard hats, safety glasses, high-vis, steel caps, hearing protection — whatever the job requires.

Subcontractors on your site

If you engage subbies, you share the duty of care. You cannot sign away your WHS obligations in a subcontractor agreement — the law overrides the contract. What you should do is have a written agreement that spells out who is responsible for what on site, conduct expectations, and the scope of work. Make sure every subbie gets a site induction and signs off on your safety requirements before they start.

The 2026 NSW change you need to know about

From 1 July 2026, Codes of Practice in New South Wales went from "guidance you should follow" to "standards you must meet or beat." That means if there is a Code of Practice for your trade — and there is one for most high-risk construction activities — you either comply with it to the letter, or you prove that what you're doing is at least as safe. "I didn't know about the code" is not a defence.

Psychosocial hazards — yes, really

Bullying, harassment, unreasonable workloads, and poor support are now explicitly recognised as WHS hazards. You are expected to manage them with the same rigour as a fall hazard or an electrical risk. For a small trade business, this mostly means: define roles clearly, deal with conflict early, don't normalise "toughen up" culture, and make sure people know they can raise concerns without copping it.

What you actually need to document

You don't need a shelf full of binders. You need a small set of documents that are real — not generic templates you downloaded and never read. Regulators can tell the difference.

• WHS policy — one page, specific to your trade and how you actually operate.
• Risk register — a living document of identified hazards and controls. Update it when things change.
• Site induction records — signed proof that everyone on site was inducted.
• Incident reports — any injury, near miss, or dangerous occurrence. Date, what happened, what you did about it.
• Training records — who was trained on what, when, by whom.
• Consultation records — proof you talked to your team about safety decisions that affect them.

What the fines actually look like

Category 1 (reckless conduct, risk of death or serious injury): up to $3 million for a business, $600,000 for an individual, or 5 years in prison. Category 2 (failure to comply, risk of death or serious injury): up to $1.5 million for a business. Category 3 (failure to comply, no serious risk): up to $500,000. These are not theoretical — SafeWork issues them regularly, and trade businesses are the most common recipients.