Farm safety risk assessments — what the law expects you to keep

General information, not legal advice. Safety law differs in detail between states, and incident-notification rules are being changed state by state right now. Check the specifics with your state's regulator (linked below).

Why this is worth an afternoon

Agriculture, forestry and fishing has the highest work fatality rate of any industry in Australia. In 2024 it was 13.7 deaths per 100,000 workers, against 1.3 across all industries, which is roughly ten times the national rate. The sector recorded 44 of the year's 188 worker deaths, and it also had the highest rate of serious workers' compensation claims. Across all industries, vehicles were involved in two-thirds of work deaths, and on farms that includes tractors, quads and side-by-sides.

The legal consequences have also hardened. Every Australian jurisdiction now has an industrial (or workplace) manslaughter offence, with Tasmania the last to commence in October 2024, and penalties for safety breaches continue to rise. Victoria, for example, legislated higher penalties for reckless endangerment in September 2026, and a new aggravated offence for breaching the general duty is due to commence by 26 April 2028. You do not need to know the penalty schedule. What matters is that the question asked after an incident is the same everywhere: what did you do about the risk before it happened?

Which law applies to you

NSW, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Western Australia, the Northern Territory and the ACT all run versions of the model Work Health and Safety (WHS) laws. Victoria runs its own Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 (OHS Act). The wording differs, but the core is the same in both:

• The duty sits with the business. Under the WHS laws that is the "person conducting a business or undertaking", or PCBU. In Victoria it is the employer or self-employed person. A family company, a trust, a partnership and a sole trader all count.
• It covers more than employees. Under the WHS laws, "worker" includes contractors, labour-hire workers, work-experience students and volunteers. Both regimes also cover visitors and anyone else put at risk by the work, including the agent at the yards, the carrier at the loading ramp and the neighbour's kids.
• The standard is "so far as is reasonably practicable". That means weighing how likely the harm is, how bad it would be, what you know (or ought to know) about the hazard and the ways to control it, and whether those controls are available and suitable. Cost counts, but only if it is grossly disproportionate to the risk.

Officers (directors and others who make decisions for the business) also carry a personal due-diligence duty to make sure the business is meeting its obligations. On a family farm, that is usually the same people who own it.

The process the law actually asks for

The WHS regulations and the regulators' guidance set out a four-step cycle. Victoria's approach is the same in substance.

1. Identify the hazards. Walk the job, not the office. Think about what is done, where, with what gear and animals, and by whom.
2. Assess the risks. How likely is it, and how bad could it be? A rating matrix is a tool for this. No regulator mandates a particular one.
3. Control the risks, from the top of the hierarchy down. Eliminate the hazard if you can. If you can't, minimise it by substituting something safer, isolating people from the hazard, or changing the equipment or facility (engineering). Only then rely on procedures, training and signage, and finally PPE. Administrative controls and PPE depend on people getting it right every time, which is why they sit at the bottom.
4. Review the controls. The regulations require a review when a control isn't doing its job, before a change that could bring a new risk (a new crush, a new vehicle, a new task), when a new hazard turns up, and after an incident. A scheduled date makes sure the review happens even when nothing prompts it.

Through all four steps you must consult the people doing the work. The worker who handles the bulls every day usually knows exactly where the near-misses happen.

Is a written assessment compulsory?

For most farm tasks, the law requires you to carry out the process rather than complete a particular form. Producers often stop there, and that is a mistake, for three reasons:

• Some records are mandatory. Under the WHS regulations, hazardous chemicals kept at the workplace generally need a register with a current safety data sheet (SDS) for each product. Household quantities in consumer packaging are an exception. Notifiable incidents must be recorded and the record kept for at least five years, and that applies in Victoria too.
• Codes of practice set the benchmark. Approved codes of practice can be used in court as evidence of what is known about a hazard and how to control it. NSW's Safe use and storage of agricultural and veterinary chemicals Code of Practice, for example, which commenced in March 2026, expects risk assessments, a chemical register with SDS, and training records, and it expressly accepts electronic records.
• After an incident, the record is the evidence. An inspector will ask what you identified, what you put in place, who was told and when you last checked. A dated assessment, signed off by the people doing the work, answers those questions. Memory does not.

The six jobs to start with on a cattle place

You don't need an assessment for every gate you open. Start with the work that kills and maims people on farms, and write each one up as its own assessment, tied to the place where it happens.

1. Cattle yards, crush and loading

The hazards are crush and kick injuries, being pinned against rails, bulls and cows with calves, working in the forcing pen, loading ramps, and zoonoses such as Q fever. The strongest controls are physical: yard design that keeps people outside the pen, man-gates and escape gaps, a crush with side access, and non-slip ramps. Behind those come a rule against working the forcing pen alone, decisions about who handles bulls, and Q fever vaccination for people who work with cattle regularly.

2. Quad bikes and side-by-sides

The main hazards are rollover, loss of control on slopes and creek crossings, overloading and towing, and carrying passengers on a single-seat quad. Ask first whether the job needs a quad at all, or whether a side-by-side with a rollover structure and seatbelts would suit it better. Since 11 October 2021, new general-use quads sold in Australia must have an operator protection device and meet minimum stability standards under the ACCC's mandatory safety standard. Older bikes can be retrofitted. After that come helmets, no children on adult-sized bikes, and rules for the paddocks you know are steep.

3. Tractors and machinery

Rollover, run-over, unguarded PTO shafts, hydraulics and raised loads, hitching, and maintenance on running machinery account for a large share of farm deaths. The controls are rollover protection with seatbelts, PTO guards that are actually fitted, isolating machines and lowering loads before any work on them, and keeping people clear when hitching.

4. Chemical handling and storage

Drenches, dips, pour-ons, herbicides and fuel bring risks of poisoning, skin and eye exposure, spills and fire. Use the least hazardous product that does the job, store chemicals in a bunded, ventilated, lockable store away from living areas, keep the register and SDS current, and put PPE and first aid at the point of use. The chemical register you keep for LPA covers much of the same ground.

5. Working at height

The hazards are falls from silos, windmills, tank tops, fragile roofs, truck decks and ladders, plus confined-space entry into silos and tanks and contact with overhead powerlines. Doing the job from the ground is the best control. Where that isn't possible, use fixed platforms and guardrails rather than leaning ladders, never enter a silo or tank alone, and mark the powerlines before moving machinery under them.

6. Manual handling

Lifting calves, handling hay, moving panels, fencing and repetitive yard work cause the steady stream of back and shoulder injuries behind many compensation claims. Mechanical aids, smaller loads, two-person lifts, rotating tasks, and planning hot-weather work around the heat do more than "lift with your legs".

Making it stick

• Make it specific. "Take care in the yards" isn't a control. "Nobody works the forcing pen alone; the back pen gate stays chained" is.
• Rate it honestly. Some risks are still high after every practicable control, and quads on steep country are the usual example. Writing that down, and listing the next action with an owner and a date, is better evidence than a page that marks everything as low.
• Get it signed. Have each worker sign that they have read and understood the assessment for the work they do. That doubles as the induction record. When the assessment changes, get it signed again.
• Never overwrite. A review should create a new version, and the old version should be kept. The history shows the risk was being managed over time.
• Log near-misses. The cow that went over the rail and the quad that nearly tipped are the cheapest warnings you will get. Each one should trigger a review of the relevant assessment.

When something goes wrong

If anyone is still in danger, call 000 first. Then, in every state:

• Notify your regulator immediately after you become aware of a work-related death, serious injury or illness, or a dangerous incident. Some dangerous incidents must be notified even if nobody was hurt.
• Leave the scene undisturbed until an inspector arrives or tells you otherwise. You may still help an injured person, protect people's safety, or make the area safe.
• Keep the record of the notification for at least five years.

The notification rules are changing. In December 2025 Safe Work Australia amended the model WHS Act to extend notification to dangerous incidents involving mobile plant and falls, violent incidents, work-related suicide and attempted suicide, and worker absences of 15 or more days. Those changes only take effect as each state adopts them, on its own timeline. Check your regulator's page rather than relying on a list you saw once.

State	Regulator	Notify by phone
NSW	SafeWork NSW	13 10 50 (24/7)
QLD	WorkSafe Queensland	1300 362 128
VIC	WorkSafe Victoria	13 23 60
WA	WorkSafe WA	1800 678 198 (24 hours)
SA	SafeWork SA	1800 777 209 (death or life-threatening, 24 hours) · 1300 365 255 (other, business hours)
TAS	WorkSafe Tasmania	1300 366 322
NT	NT WorkSafe	1800 019 115
ACT	WorkSafe ACT	13 22 81 (business hours) · 0419 120 028 (after hours)

Numbers read off each regulator's own incident-notification page on 7 October 2026. Your regulator is the one for the state the work happened in.

A records checklist

1. A written, dated risk assessment for each high-risk activity, with a review date.
2. Evidence that workers were consulted and have read the assessments for their work, signed and dated.
3. Training and induction records, including licences and tickets where required.
4. A hazardous chemicals register with current safety data sheets.
5. An incident and near-miss log, with notifications to the regulator recorded and kept for at least five years.
6. Superseded versions of each assessment, kept rather than overwritten.

Where Tagline fits — and where it doesn't

Tagline has a Work Safety section under Compliance, alongside the LPA documents and audits. It covers the six activities above, with a worked example for each so you can see what a finished assessment looks like before you rate your own. Assessments are versioned: a review creates a new version and the old one is kept, never overwritten. Workers sign that they have read and understood an assessment on the phone or tablet, and that sign-off doubles as the induction record. There is an incident and near-miss log that starts a review of the related assessment, and it shows the incident number for your own state's regulator, worked out from the property's PIC. Review and action due dates appear in the compliance calendar, and Yard Mode tells you whether the yard you are about to work has a current assessment.

To be clear about the limits: the 5×5 risk matrix in Tagline is our own, not a regulator's, because none of the regulators we checked prescribes one. Keeping assessments in Tagline does not by itself make a farm compliant. The duty is to actually control the risks and consult the people doing the work, and software can only record that you did. Tagline is a compliance record-keeper, not a rostering, HR or general safety-management platform, and it doesn't replace advice from your regulator.

Frequently asked questions

General information for Australian producers. Not legal advice. WHS law and incident-notification rules are changing state by state, so confirm the current position with your regulator before relying on any of it.

Sources

• Key Work Health and Safety Statistics Australia 2025 (2024 fatality data) — data.safeworkaustralia.gov.au
• Managing risks in agriculture — Safe Work Australia
• Model Code of Practice: How to manage work health and safety risks — Safe Work Australia
• Incident notification, including the December 2025 model Act changes — Safe Work Australia
• Guide to managing risks in cattle handling — Safe Work Australia
• Code of Practice: Safe use and storage of agricultural and veterinary chemicals (2026) — SafeWork NSW
• Report an incident (Victoria) — WorkSafe Victoria
• Quad bike safety standard — ACCC Product Safety Australia
• Victorian Government response to the Sentencing Advisory Council's OHS sentencing report (Sept 2026) — dtf.vic.gov.au