Commonwealth Numbered Acts

OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY (COMMONWEALTH EMPLOYMENT) ACT 1991 No. 30, 1991 - SECT 19

19. (1) A supplier of any plant or substance that the supplier ought
reasonably to expect will be used by employees at work must take all
reasonably practicable steps:

   (a)  to ensure that, at the time of supply, the plant or substance is in
        such condition as to be, when properly used, safe for employees and
        without risk to their health; and

   (b)  to carry out, or cause to be carried out, the research, testing and
        examination necessary in order to discover, and to eliminate or
        minimise, any risk, to the health or safety of employees, that may
        arise from the condition of the plant or substance; and

   (c)  to make available to an employer, in connection with the use of the
        plant or substance by employees at work, adequate information
        concerning:

        (i)    the condition of the plant or substance at the time of supply;
               and

        (ii)   any risk to the health and safety of employees to which the
               condition of the plant or substance may give rise unless it is
               properly used; and

        (iii)  the steps that need to be taken in order to eliminate such
               risk; and

        (iv)   in the case of a substance - the first aid and medical
               procedures that should be followed in the event of the
               condition of the substance causing injury to an employee.
Penalty: $20,000.

(2) For the purposes of subsection (1), where a person (in this subsection
called the "ostensible supplier") supplies to an employer any plant or
substance that is to be used by employees at work, and the ostensible
supplier:

   (a)  carries on the business of financing the acquisition or the use of
        goods by other persons; and

   (b)  has, in the course of that business, acquired an interest in the plant
        or substance solely for the purpose of financing its acquisition by
        the employer from a third person, or its provision to the employer by
        a third person; and

   (c)  has not taken possession of the plant or substance or has taken
        possession of the plant or substance solely for the purpose of passing
        possession of the plant or substance to that employer; the reference
        in subsection (1) to a supplier is, in relation to the plant or
        substance referred to in this subsection, to be read as a reference to
        the third person and not as a reference to the ostensible supplier.

(3) Nothing in this section affects the operation of the Trade Practices Act
1974, or of any other law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory that
imposes an obligation in respect of the sale or supply of goods or in respect
of the information to be supplied in relation to goods.