All business industry heat maps

Workplace Health and Safety Queensland (WHSQ) has traditionally used planning methods centred on claim numbers and claim rates (numbers of claims expressed as a ratio of workers covered). WHSQ introduced a harm index in 2011 in an effort to incorporate the severity of claims into the planning process.

The harm index is a ratio of total statutory costs (an indicator of severity) to the exposure (i.e. workers covered) within a given cohort to give an assessment of risk, which represents the relative harm workers are likely to sustain during their working lives.

The heat map is an enhancement of this harm index. Similar to the concept of the harm index, the heat map provides a visual representation of relative risk. In 2018 the heat maps also compare the index of each industry sector at the three digit ANZSIC level across two Census years.

These heat maps have been generated using on-duty at place of work finalised claims only. Three heat maps were produced using the following conditions:

• All on-duty claims, excluding on-duty road traffic incidents.
• Serious on-duty at place of work claims (five or more days off work, excluding on-duty road traffic incidents).
• On-duty road traffic incidents only.

This report groups all industry sectors into three categories:

• green (low harm) - index values are at or below the all industry average
• orange (medium harm) - industries above and up to twice the average
• red (high harm) - industries with index values at more than twice the average value.

All results have been calculated using a consistent methodology across both the 2011 and 2016 Census years to allow for direct comparisons. Therefore, index values and colours may differ from previous reports published. The reference point is the 2016 Census results.

Results

The heat map for on-duty at place of work claims revealed the industries that demonstrated exceptionally high index values and a large number of claims included:

• Construction
• Manufacturing
• Transport, postal and warehousing
• Agriculture, forestry and fishing
• Wholesale trade.

Other industries that were also revealed to be poor performers included:

• Administrative and support services
• Arts and recreation services
• Electricity, gas, water and waste services.

Construction industry

Similar to other injury risk measures, the Construction industry recorded the highest average index value of 238 (or 2.38 times the all industry average), while also holding the second largest number of claims after Manufacturing (13 per cent of all claims).

A large proportion (75 per cent) of the Construction industry comprised high risk industry sub sectors. These high risk sub sectors included:

The heat map revealed a general worsening of results in the Construction industry over time relative to other industries. This could mean a slower improvement on average, costlier claims and/or a higher rate of claims.

Manufacturing industry

Similar to other injury risk measures, the Manufacturing industry recorded the second highest average index value of 195 (or 1.95 times the all industry average), while also holding the largest number of claims (17 per cent of all claims).

Accordingly, the heat map revealed that the Manufacturing industry has many high harm sub sectors, with nearly half of Manufacturing sub sectors shaded red (41 per cent). The industry sub sectors that recorded exceptionally high index values and claim numbers (greater than 300) included:

Transport, Postal and Warehousing industry

The heat map revealed that on average, the Transport, Postal and Warehousing industry demonstrated index levels that were 1.7 times the average, slightly more than in 2011 (1.6 times). The result was largely attributed to Pipeline and Other Transport (686), Water Passenger Transport (450), Road Freight Transport (339), and Water Freight Transport (327). All of these sub sectors have remained high risk over time.

Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing industry

The harm index for Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing was 147 or 1.47 times the all industry average risk. This is an improvement since the 2011 Census period when the industry was high risk with an index of 212, despite an increase in claims. Possible reasons for this include a faster relative improvement over time, cheaper claims and/or industry growth and lower claim rates.

High risk industry sub sectors in Agriculture include Other Livestock Farming (262), Sheep, Beef Cattle and Grain Farming (232), and Agriculture and Fishing Support Services (229). All three of these sub sectors have remained high risk over time.

Wholesale Trade industry

This industry's performance over the two Census periods worsened significantly. In 2011 it was deemed low harm at less than the all industry average and in 2016 it was 1.39 times risker than the all industry average (medium harm). This is despite a decrease in claims over the same period. There are a number of possible reasons for this including higher claim rates, more expensive claims on average, or a slower improvement relative to other industries.

High risk industry sub sectors include Mineral, Metal and Chemical Wholesaling (230), and Specialised Industrial Machinery and Equipment Wholesaling (202). While both these sub sectors' claims have reduced over time, their harm indices have increased. This could be due to more expensive claims, higher claim rates or relatively slower improvement over time compared to other industries.

Administrative and Support Services industry

Overall, this industry remained relatively consistent over time with a medium harm risk for both 2016 and 2011 (123 and 167 harm indices respectively).

Medium risk industry sub sectors include Building Cleaning, Pest Control and Gardening Services (187) and Employment Services (133). These two sub sectors had high risk index levels in the 2011 Census period.

Arts and Recreation Services industry

Overall, this industry remained relatively consistent over time with a medium harm risk for both 2016 and 2011 (118 and 120 harm indices respectively).

Horse and Dog Racing Activities recorded an exceptionally high index level of 1190. This was higher than in the previous period although it was still exceptionally high then (997). Almost one in five claims for the industry was for this sub sector.

Other high risk industry sub sectors

The industry sub sectors in the table below recorded high index values. However, Educational Support Services had a relatively low number of claims (34). This is likely due to a few very large claims. Other Health Care Services, and Public Order and Safety Services, were also high risk in the previous 2011 period.

Serious on-duty at place of work claims (five or more days off work)

The heat map produced for serious claims revealed that high risk industry sub sectors were very similar to all finalised claims.

Likewise, the Construction industry was of the highest risk, largely due to a high proportion of sub sectors in the high risk category in 2016 (63 per cent). Namely, the high risk sub sectors included Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction (471), Land Development and Site Preparation Services (397), Other Construction Services (393), Building Structure Services (382) and Building Completion Services (266).

Harm index improvements between 2011 and 2016 occurred in Building Structure Services and Building Completion Services with a 22 and 18 decrease respectively. Other high harm sub sectors in Construction did not fare so well with a notable worsening of the harm index for Heavy and Civil Engineering Construction (up from 199 to 471 in 2016).

Manufacturing was again in second place with a risk index of 1.8 times the all industry average. High risk sub sectors for serious claims included Other Manufacturing (1,963), Sheet Metal Product Manufacturing (except Metal Structural and Container Products) (668), Other Fabricated Metal Product Manufacturing (605), Specialised Machinery and Equipment Manufacturing (571), Structural Metal Product Manufacturing (369), and Other Wood Product Manufacturing (348) sub sectors.

While the harm index for Other Manufacturing increased to 1963 in 2016 from 281 in 2011, Other Fabricated Metal Product Manufacturing improved over the period, from 771 to 605.

Outside of the top two industries, high-risk sub sectors included Horse and Dog Racing Activities (1257), Pipeline and Other Transport (707), and Road Freight Transport (370).

It is interesting to note that, while serious claims represent 39 per cent of all finalised on-duty at place of work claims for all industries, this percentage drops to 29 percent in the manufacturing sector. The highest conversion rate to serious claims was 48 per cent for both Health Care and Social Services and Agriculture, Forestry and Fishing industries. In agriculture at least, it is expected that many less serious injuries are often under reported, driving this conversion rate up.

On-duty road traffic incidents

A version of the heat map was created to investigate injuries caused by on-duty road traffic incidents. These types of claims averaged only 889 in total over the 2016 Census period so the results must be treated with caution. Indices where the number of claims are small are not reliable. The heat map revealed the following industry sub sectors as having the highest risk:

Sources: Queensland Employee Injury Database (QEIDB) (data extracted January 2018) and ABS, Censuses 2011 and 2016.

Results for on-duty road traffic incidents exclude all those sub sectors where there are less than ten claims. These results show that many high risk sub sectors are in the Transport, Postal and Warehousing and Wholesale industries, as expected.