Standards Update: ISO 45001:2018

On 10 March, 25 members of TC283’s Occupational Health and Safety technical Group 4 (TG4) met for the first time to consider ‘emerging OH&S themes’. The purpose of this work is to inform the contents of future ISO 45000 series standards, helping these standards remain relevant and forward-looking.

TG4 will not be concerned with producing new standards itself but will instead create ‘white papers’ to inform the development of existing OH&S standards. It intends it’s work to be inclusive, and will actively create liaisons with forward-looking organisations and academia in order to solicit their views as to what future OH&S editions should incorporate.

Initial themes put forward for further investigation include:

• The blurring boundaries of work and the workplace

• How external factors affect worker health and safety inside/outside of work

• Risk management

• Psychosocial risk

• Drug use/impairment at work

• Climate change impacts on OH&S, including the move from fossil fuels

• Emerging technologies, including medical advances

• Global networks and the supply chain

• Modern slavery, transport issues, outsourcing and contractors

• Effective implementation, conformity assessment and leadership

• Worker representatives and consultation

• Water availability, quality & distribution

• Agility & change management

• Demographic change

• The competence and availability of OH&S experts

Subgroups of TG4 will now consider each of the above before reporting back to the next meeting of the Group on 16 April. At that meeting the Group will decide which of the above to prioritise formore detailed examination as to their suitability for inclusion in future revisions of OH&S standards.