OHS Act 1: Functions of Health and Safety Representatives
A Health and Safety Representative has been appointed. But what are they actually supposed to do?
This is where many workplace health and safety systems fall short.
The appointment letter is signed. The employee's name appears in the Health and Safety File. Perhaps they have even attended SHE Representative training.
But then nothing happens.
No workplace inspections. No employee concerns are raised. No participation in incident investigations. No review of safety measures. No involvement in audits.
Section 18 of the Occupational Health and Safety Act, 1993 (Act 85 of 1993) makes it clear that a Health and Safety Representative is intended to be an active participant in workplace health and safety.
Section 17 establishes how Health and Safety Representatives are designated. Section 18 then gives those representatives specific functions and entitlements that allow them to meaningfully represent employees.
A SHE Representative should therefore never exist only on paper.
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Why Does Section 18 Exist? Employees are often the people closest to workplace hazards. They work with the machinery. They use the tools. They handle the chemicals. They walk the access routes. They work from the scaffolding. They experience the procedures in practice. They often notice unsafe conditions before those conditions appear in an audit report or result in an incident. Section 18 gives Health and Safety Representatives a structured way to identify these concerns, investigate them, communicate them to management and participate in improving workplace health and safety. It creates a direct link between employees, management and the health and safety system. What Can a Health and Safety Representative Do? Section 18(1) provides a detailed list of functions that a Health and Safety Representative may perform in respect of the workplace or section for which they have been designated. These functions cover far more than simply completing a monthly inspection checklist. They include reviewing safety controls, identifying hazards, participating in incident investigations, dealing with employee complaints, communicating concerns and interacting with inspectors. Let's look at what these functions mean in practice. 1. Review the Effectiveness of Health and Safety Measures Section 18(1)(a) allows a Health and Safety Representative to review whether existing health and safety measures are actually effective. This is an important distinction. A safety control may exist without necessarily working properly. For example, an employer may have:
The question is not simply: "Is the control there?" The better question is: "Is the control actually protecting employees?" A barricade that employees can easily walk through may not be effective. A machine guard that does not prevent access to dangerous moving parts may not be effective. A dust mask that is unsuitable for the identified contaminant may not adequately protect the employee. A SHE Representative can help identify these weaknesses before they contribute to an incident. 2. Identify Potential Hazards and Major Incidents Section 18(1)(b) allows representatives to identify potential hazards and potential major incidents within the workplace. Hazard identification is one of the most valuable functions a representative can perform. Examples could include:
The representative does not need to wait for someone to get hurt before raising the concern. That is the entire purpose of proactive safety management. Find the hazard before the hazard finds someone. 3. Help Examine the Causes of Workplace Incidents When an incident occurs, simply blaming the injured employee rarely solves the problem. Section 18(1)(c) allows a Health and Safety Representative, in collaboration with the employer, to examine the causes of workplace incidents. This can help the organisation move beyond asking: "Who made the mistake?" and towards asking: "Why was the situation possible in the first place?" Consider an employee falling from a ladder. The immediate cause might appear to be that the employee lost balance. But further examination could reveal:
Finding the underlying causes allows the employer to implement controls that reduce the chance of the incident happening again. 4. Investigate Employee Health and Safety Complaints Section 18(1)(d) allows the representative to investigate complaints made by employees concerning their health or safety at work. This gives employees an important channel for raising concerns. An employee may report that:
The representative can investigate the concern and determine whether it needs to be escalated. Employees should therefore know who their Health and Safety Representative is and feel comfortable approaching them. 5. Make Representations to the Employer or Health and Safety Committee Identifying a problem means very little if nobody does anything about it. Section 18(1)(e) allows the representative to make representations to the employer or Health and Safety Committee regarding safety measures, hazards, incidents and employee complaints. Where those representations are unsuccessful, the Act provides for representations to an inspector. This gives the SHE Representative a formal route for escalating unresolved health and safety matters. A good workplace should encourage concerns to be raised and addressed internally before they develop into serious incidents. 6. Raise General Health and Safety Matters Not every concern begins with a specific incident or employee complaint. Section 18(1)(f) allows representatives to make representations to the employer regarding general matters affecting employee health or safety. This could include concerns about:
This allows the representative to contribute to continuous improvement rather than only reacting to individual problems. 7. Inspect the Workplace One of the most recognisable SHE Representative functions is workplace inspection. Section 18(1)(g) allows a representative to inspect the workplace, including articles, substances, plant, machinery and health and safety equipment, at intervals agreed upon with the employer. The representative must give the employer reasonable notice of the intention to perform the inspection, and the employer may be present. A meaningful inspection should not simply involve ticking boxes. The representative should observe how work is actually being performed. For example: Is equipment in good condition? Are guards fitted? Are emergency exits accessible? Is PPE being used correctly? Are chemicals properly stored? Are access routes clear? Are employees following safe procedures? Are existing safety controls still effective? A good inspection should identify problems before an incident forces the organisation to identify them. 8. Participate in Inspections by Labour Inspectors A Health and Safety Representative is also entitled to participate when inspectors visit the workplace. Section 18 allows representatives to participate in consultations with inspectors and accompany inspectors during workplace inspections. This makes sense because the representative understands the day-to-day conditions experienced by employees. They may be able to provide valuable information about:
Their role helps ensure that employee health and safety concerns are represented during the inspection process. 9. Receive Information from Inspectors Section 18(1)(i) allows Health and Safety Representatives to receive information from inspectors as contemplated in Section 36 of the Act. This further strengthens the representative's role within the communication structure between employees, employers and regulatory authorities. 10. Attend Health and Safety Committee Meetings Where the representative is a member of a Health and Safety Committee, Section 18(1)(j) allows them to attend committee meetings in connection with their functions. This is where information gathered through inspections, employee complaints, incident reviews and workplace observations can become part of formal health and safety discussions. A functioning committee should therefore not simply meet to satisfy a legal requirement. It should provide a platform where identified concerns are: Raised → Discussed → Assigned → Corrected → Closed out. What Is a Health and Safety Representative Entitled to Do? Section 18(2) goes further than describing functions. It establishes specific entitlements that help representatives perform those functions effectively. These include the ability to visit incident sites, participate in investigations and inquiries, inspect certain documents, accompany inspectors, obtain technical assistance with employer approval and participate in internal health and safety audits. These rights are important because a representative cannot meaningfully participate in workplace safety without access to relevant information and activities. Visit the Site of an Incident A representative is entitled to visit the site of an incident at reasonable times and attend an inspection in loco. Seeing the actual incident location can provide information that may not be obvious from written reports. The representative may observe:
These observations can contribute to understanding what happened. Attend Investigations and Formal Inquiries Health and Safety Representatives may attend investigations or formal inquiries held under the Act. This ensures that employee representation is maintained during formal processes following serious health and safety events. Inspect Relevant Health and Safety Documents Where reasonably necessary for performing their functions, representatives may inspect documents that the employer is legally required to keep. Depending on the workplace and circumstances, relevant documentation may assist a representative in understanding whether appropriate systems and controls are being maintained. Access to information allows representatives to make better-informed observations and recommendations. Be Accompanied by a Technical Adviser Some workplace hazards are highly technical. A representative cannot reasonably be expected to be an expert in every field. Section 18 therefore allows the representative, with the employer's approval—which may not be unreasonably withheld—to be accompanied by a technical adviser during an inspection. This could be particularly valuable when dealing with specialised machinery, complex engineering systems or technical occupational health concerns. Participate in Internal Health and Safety Audits Section 18(2)(f) expressly entitles the representative to participate in internal health or safety audits. This can be extremely valuable. Audits provide a structured opportunity to evaluate whether the organisation's health and safety system is actually functioning. Representatives can contribute practical employee-level knowledge that may otherwise be missed during a documentation-focused audit. Employers Must Provide Facilities, Assistance and Training A representative cannot fulfil the role effectively without support. Section 18(3) requires the employer to provide the facilities, assistance and training that the representative may reasonably require and that have been agreed upon for carrying out their functions. The General Administrative Regulations also require consultation around the facilities, training and assistance to be provided. This is a critical employer responsibility. Simply giving an employee an appointment letter and expecting them to understand occupational health and safety legislation is not enough. Representatives should receive appropriate training so that they can understand matters such as:
Training turns an appointment into a functioning safety resource. Is a SHE Representative Personally Liable if They Miss Something? This is an important concern for employees accepting the role. Section 18(4) provides that a Health and Safety Representative does not incur civil liability merely because they failed to do something that they may do or are required to do under the Act. In other words, the appointment does not automatically make the representative personally civilly liable simply because they failed to identify a hazard or perform one of their Section 18 functions. This protection is expressly included in the Act. This is important because Health and Safety Representatives are there to participate in and support workplace health and safety—not to replace the employer's legal responsibilities. A SHE Representative Does Not Replace the Employer This is perhaps the most important misunderstanding to address. Appointing a Health and Safety Representative does not transfer the employer's responsibility for providing a safe workplace onto that employee. The employer remains responsible for complying with the Occupational Health and Safety Act. A representative helps: identify, review, investigate, communicate and participate. They should not become the person management blames whenever something goes wrong. Health and safety remains a shared system with defined responsibilities at different levels. What Does an Effective SHE Representative Look Like? An effective Health and Safety Representative is visible and involved. They know their workplace. They speak to employees. They participate in inspections. They report hazards. They follow up on concerns. They participate in investigations. They attend Health and Safety Committee meetings where applicable. They understand that their role is not about catching people doing something wrong. It is about helping identify what could go wrong—and helping the workplace address it before somebody gets hurt. Common Section 18 Mistakes One of the most common mistakes is treating the appointment itself as compliance. Other practical failures include representatives who receive no training, inspections that are never performed, employee complaints that are never followed up, representatives excluded from incident investigations, representatives who do not attend committee meetings, and inspection findings that are recorded but never closed out. A completed checklist is not the objective. Risk reduction is the objective. A Practical Construction Example Imagine a SHE Representative walking through a construction site. During the inspection, they notice that a mobile scaffold has been moved into another area. The scaffold appears complete, but there is no indication available to the representative that it has been inspected following relocation. Instead of ignoring it, the representative raises the concern with site management. The scaffold is checked by the responsible competent person and a problem is identified with one of the components. The scaffold is corrected before employees use it. No injury occurs. No incident investigation is required. No employee falls. Nothing dramatic happens. And that is exactly what successful health and safety often looks like. The incident that never happened. From Section 17 to Section 18 Sections 17 and 18 should be understood together. Section 17 establishes the representative. Section 18 gives that representative functions and entitlements. Having Section 17 without properly implementing Section 18 creates a representative who exists only on paper. The goal should be an employee representative who actively contributes to improving workplace safety. How Zenith Safety Consultants Can Help At Zenith Safety Consultants (ZSC), we assist businesses with developing practical Health and Safety Representative systems that function beyond the appointment letter. Our services include Health and Safety Representative documentation and guidance, workplace inspections, risk assessments, Health and Safety Committee documentation, legal compliance audits, Health and Safety Files, toolbox talks, incident investigation support and occupational health and safety training. We help businesses move from paper compliance to practical compliance. Final Thoughts Section 18 gives Health and Safety Representatives something extremely important: A voice—and the ability to use it. They can inspect. They can identify hazards. They can investigate complaints. They can participate in incident investigations. They can raise concerns with management. They can participate in audits. They can accompany inspectors. And they can contribute directly to improving the safety of the people they represent. But those powers only become meaningful when the employer supports the role and the representative actively performs it. Don't appoint a SHE Representative simply because the legislation requires one. Train them. Support them. Listen to them. And use their involvement to identify today's hazard before it becomes tomorrow's incident. For more information on how Zenith Safety Consultants can help your business, please contact us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or call 021 010 0209. |
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