Psychosocial hazards: Western Australia

Key takeaways

WA came late to the national model, adopting the Work Health and Safety Act 2020 (WA), which commenced on 31 March 2022 and replaced the old occupational safety and health regime.
The psychosocial duty is positive: eliminate psychosocial risk so far as reasonably practicable, and minimise what you can't eliminate.
WorkSafe WA sits within the state government and enforces the WHS Act. It also publishes a code of practice on psychosocial hazards that a court can treat as evidence of what's reasonable.
WA has a WHS-specific texture the eastern states don't. Fly-in fly-out work, remote and isolated sites, and the resources sector put remote work and isolation front and centre.
The duty applies to every business regardless of size or industry. A small office in Perth carries the same obligation as a mine site in the Pilbara.

A client running a services business in Perth told us she'd assumed the psychosocial rules were "an eastern states thing" that hadn't reached WA yet. She was surprised to learn WA had a full duty in force, and had done for a while. She's not the only one who's made that assumption.

So let's answer the question WA employers are actually asking. What does the law require, and what does WorkSafe WA expect to see?

What WA actually adopted, and when

WA was one of the last jurisdictions to sign up to the national model. For years it ran its own Occupational Safety and Health Act 1984, separate from the framework the rest of the country was using. That changed with the Work Health and Safety Act 2020 (WA), which commenced on 31 March 2022 and brought WA into line with the model WHS law that Safe Work Australia drafts.

The practical upshot is that WA now uses the same core concepts as most of Australia: the PCBU (person conducting a business or undertaking), the primary duty of care, and the positive obligation to manage psychosocial risk. If you've read guidance written for another model-law state, most of it maps here. Just check the references, because the WA regulations and codes carry their own names.

WorkSafe WA is the state's WHS regulator. It publishes a code of practice on psychosocial hazards in the workplace. Like every code, it isn't the law itself, but it's admissible as evidence of what's reasonably practicable, so it's worth reading rather than skimming.

The duty, in plain terms

Every PCBU in WA has a positive duty. In plain language, that means:

Eliminate psychosocial risks so far as reasonably practicable.
Where you can't eliminate a risk, minimise it so far as reasonably practicable.

That's a higher bar than waiting for a complaint. It expects you to go looking for hazards and act on them before they cause harm, not to respond only once someone's already been hurt.

The hazards that show up most in WA

The common psychosocial hazards are broadly consistent across the country, and we cover the full set in our guide to psychosocial hazards. In WA workplaces, the ones we see causing the most trouble in our consulting work are:

Excessive job demands or unrealistic deadlines
Low job control, where people have no real say in how their work gets done
Poor support from managers or peers
Poor workplace relationships, including conflict and bullying
Remote or isolated work with little line of sight from anyone
Poorly managed organisational change

That second-last one carries extra weight in WA. More on that next.

Why WA is its own case: remote work and the resources sector

Here's what makes WA genuinely distinct. A large share of the state's economy runs on mining, energy, and resources, and a lot of that work is fly-in fly-out or based on remote sites hundreds of kilometres from anywhere.

Remote and isolated work is a recognised psychosocial hazard everywhere. In WA it's not an edge case, it's the everyday reality for a big chunk of the workforce. Long rosters, time away from family, limited social contact, and the sheer distance from support all stack up. Managing psychosocial risk in that context looks different from managing it in a CBD office.

WA also runs separate work health and safety regulations for the mining and resources sector, so a resources employer has an extra layer to work through on top of the general duty. If you operate camps, rosters, or remote sites, your psychosocial risk assessment has to take the isolation seriously rather than treat it as a footnote. A control that works for a Perth head office won't automatically cover a crew on a two-week swing.

What a WA employer should actually do now

Here's where we'd start, in order.

Run a proper risk assessment. Not a survey nobody reads, an honest look at where your workload, control, support, relationship, and isolation risks actually sit. See our guide to psychosocial risk assessment.
Take remote and isolated work seriously if any of your people work that way. Rosters, contact, and support on remote sites are a live hazard, not a wellbeing nicety.
Consult your workers. WHS law requires genuine consultation, not a policy written without asking anyone.
Put controls in place and record them. A document showing what you assessed and changed is worth far more than "we're getting to it."
Review after any major change. A restructure, a new roster pattern, or a leadership change all reset the risk picture.

How WA compares to the rest of the country

Every Australian jurisdiction now has an in-force psychosocial duty, but the timing and mechanics differ. WA and South Australia both run the model WHS law, while Victoria runs a separate system entirely. If you operate across state lines, it's worth understanding those differences. See our guides to psychosocial hazards in South Australia, psychosocial hazards in New South Wales, psychosocial hazards in Queensland, and psychosocial hazards in Victoria. Start with our complete guide to psychosocial safety for the complete picture.

Culture is where a lot of these risks get created and resolved, which is the work behind Whyser Work's culture practice.

A short example

We worked with a WA resources business that had a solid safety record on the physical side, hard hats, exclusion zones, the lot, but had never turned that same rigour on psychosocial risk. Their remote crews were doing long swings, and turnover on one site had crept up without anyone connecting the dots.

We didn't reinvent their safety system. We extended it. The same risk assessment discipline they already trusted got pointed at workload, isolation, and support on the remote sites. They changed a roster pattern, added regular check-ins for isolated workers, and recorded what they'd done. The point wasn't a perfect score. It was a site that could show it had looked hard at a real hazard and acted on it.

Frequently asked questions

When did WA's psychosocial duty come into force?

WA adopted the model Work Health and Safety Act 2020, which commenced on 31 March 2022. The psychosocial duty came with that framework, and WorkSafe WA has since published a code of practice on managing psychosocial hazards. The duty has been live for a while, so "WA hasn't caught up yet" isn't accurate.

Does the resources sector have extra obligations?

Yes. WA runs separate work health and safety regulations for mining and resources, so a resources employer works through that layer on top of the general duty. Remote and isolated work is a recognised psychosocial hazard, and on remote sites it's a central one rather than an edge case, so your assessment needs to take it seriously.

Is the WorkSafe WA code of practice legally binding?

Not directly. You can meet your duty a different way if you can show it's equally effective. But the code is admissible in court as evidence of what's reasonably practicable, so departing from it without a documented reason is a risk worth thinking twice about.

Is this legal advice?

No. This is general guidance to help you understand your obligations and manage risk well. It supports your duty of care, it doesn't replace your own legal and work health and safety advice for your specific circumstances. Talk to a WHS professional about your situation.

So here's the honest question worth sitting with. If a WorkSafe WA inspector asked how you manage the isolation your remote crews live with, could you show them what you've actually done, or would you be describing what you plan to do?