Work Health and Safety (Sexual and Gender-based Harassment) Code of Practice 2025
Consulting with other duty holdersConsulting with other duty holders
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Consulting with other duty holders
WHS Act section 14
Duties are not transferable
WHS Act section 16
More than 1 person can have a duty
WHS Act section 272
No contracting out
More than one person can have the same WHS duty at the same time. The WHS Act provides that where more than one person has a duty for the same matter, each person retains responsibility to meet their duty in relation to the matter and must do so to the extent to which they can influence and control the matter.
Duty holders cannot transfer their duty to another person or contract out their health and safety duties. Duty holders can make arrangements or agreements with other duty holders to assist with meeting their duties.
WHS Act section 46
Duty to consult with other duty holders
As a PCBU, you must also consult, cooperate and coordinate activities with all other persons who have a WHS duty in relation to the same matter, so far as is reasonably practicable.
For example, you might share a duty if you are involved in the same activities (e.g. your workers interact with workers of other PCBUs in the supply chain), have a duty of care for the same worker or workers (e.g. labour hire agency, host employer and building owner) or share the same workplace (e.g. work site with subcontractors; building foyer in a multi‑tenanted building; joint venture mine site).
Consulting, cooperating and coordinating with other duty holders can help you more easily and effectively control the risk of sexual and gender-based harassment, and assist each of you to comply with your duty. For example, if you engage workers through a labour-hire company, consulting and cooperating as part of contract negotiations can help ensure workers have training on the nature of sexual and gender-based harassment and the control measures in place to prevent it, and have clear reporting avenues if they experience it.
Further detail on the duty to consult with workers and other duty holders can be found in the Work Health and Safety (Work Health and Safety Consultation, Cooperation and Coordination) Code of Practice 2015 (Cth) and Work Health and Safety (Managing Psychosocial Hazards at Work) 2024 Code of Practice (Cth).