Safety system

Run your home like a work site

A mine site does not keep people alive by asking them to be careful. It names the few things that can kill, puts a physical barrier in front of each one, and checks every barrier on a schedule. A home can work the same way. This guide takes the tools Australian workplaces use by law and turns each one into something a parent can do in five minutes: rate a risk, choose a stronger control, check the controls that prevent deaths, and talk about it as a family.

Why borrow from work

Workplaces are audited. Homes are not.

Australian work health and safety law makes every business manage its risks, and inspectors check. The family home, where most young children get hurt, has no such system.

222
workers died from traumatic injuries at work in 2025: 1.5 per 100,000 workers, the most in a year since 2012.
Safe Work Australia, 2026 [1]
2.3
deaths per 100,000 mining workers in 2025 (7 deaths). Mining manages fatal hazards with critical controls.
Safe Work Australia, 2026 [1]
~89,000
Australian children and teenagers (0–18) hospitalised with an injury each year: one every 6 minutes.
AIHW 2021–22 [13]
9 in 10
injuries to babies under 1 happen at home; 3 in 4 for children aged 1–4.
AIHW 2021–22 [13]
15
children under 5 drowned in 2024–25, half of them in home pools.
Royal Life Saving, 2025 [14]

These numbers measure different things, so we don't set one against the other. Worker figures count deaths; the child figures count hospital stays. The point is the system, not the score. A workplace that left a known fatal hazard unguarded would breach the law, and an inspector could cite the model Code of Practice in a notice to fix it.[2] At home, pool barriers are one of the few hazards with a legal standard and inspectors.[11] Everything else depends on us.

Step 1

What risk is, technically

Safety work starts by separating two words people use as if they meant the same thing.

  • A hazard is "a situation or thing that has the potential to harm a person".[2] The pool, the button battery, the cup of tea.
  • Risk is "the possibility that harm (death, injury or illness) might occur when exposed to a hazard".[2] The chance a toddler reaches the pool, and how bad it is when that happens.

The mining industry's guide puts risk in one line: it is "usually measured in terms of event likelihood and consequences".[4] Most safety teams multiply the two.

Risk = Likelihood × Consequence

Likelihood is how often the harm could happen with the controls you have now. Consequence is the worst harm you can reasonably expect when it does. Rate each from 1 to 5, multiply, and read the score off the matrix.

1 Insignificantfirst aid at home 2 MinorGP visit 3 Moderateemergency or hospital 4 Majorlasting injury, scarring 5 Catastrophicdeath or brain injury
5 Almost certainweekly or more510152025
4 Likelythis year48121620
3 Possiblein childhood3691215
2 Unlikelycould happen246810
1 Rarehard to imagine12345
1–4 Low5–9 Medium10–16 High20–25 ExtremeColumns: consequence. Rows: likelihood.

Three home hazards, rated before and after a control

HazardNowControlAfter
Backyard pool, no fence, toddler at homeLikely 4 × Catastrophic 5 = 20Four-sided fence, self-closing and self-latching gate, checked monthlyUnlikely 2 × Catastrophic 5 = 10
Button battery in a TV remote with a loose coverPossible 3 × Catastrophic 5 = 15Remote with a screw-secured compartment; spares locked awayRare 1 × Catastrophic 5 = 5
Hot drink on the edge of the benchLikely 4 × Major 4 = 16Drinks to the back of the bench, lidded cup, never held with a childUnlikely 2 × Major 4 = 8
 The ratings are worked examples of the method, not measured rates. Rate your own home with what you know about it.

What the matrix teaches

Look at the "After" column. The consequence never moves. A fence makes a drowning less likely; it doesn't make drowning less deadly. Only removing the hazard (no pool, no button battery) changes the consequence. That is why the pool still scores High with a good fence, and why it needs more than one control.

Acceptable risk is lower for children

Workplace law says to eliminate a risk "so far as is reasonably practicable" and, where that isn't possible, to minimise it.[2] An adult worker can read a warning sign, judge a drop, and say no. A two-year-old can do none of that, so a home should accept less. A useful rule: any cell with a catastrophic consequence gets a physical control, however unlikely it looks. This is not a case for bubble wrap. A grazed knee sits in the green column. The matrix keeps our attention on the cells that can't be undone.

Step 2

The hierarchy of controls

Every Australian workplace must work down this list, strongest first.[2] The United States safety institute, NIOSH, teaches the same five levels.[3]

1. Eliminate

At work

Do the job at ground level so nobody can fall from height.[2]

At home

Empty the paddling pool and bucket after every use. Throw out spare button batteries. Return old medicines to the chemist.

2. Substitute

At work

Swap solvent-based paint for water-based paint.[2]

At home

Choose toys and gadgets without button batteries, or with sealed ones. Buy low, broad furniture. Pick the least toxic cleaner that does the job.

3. Isolate and engineer

At work

Guard rails, machine guards, safety switches (RCDs).[2]

At home

A four-sided pool fence with a self-closing gate. A locked medicine cabinet. Furniture strapped to the wall. A tempering valve that holds bathroom water at 50°C. Stair gates.

4. Administrative

At work

Procedures, time limits, warning signs.[2]

At home

Supervision. House rules ("drinks to the back of the bench"). A water-watcher at every party. The Take 5 below.

5. Personal protective equipment

At work

Hard hats, gloves, eye protection.[2]

At home

Bike helmets, life jackets, sun hats, oven mitts.

Why supervision is the weakest control

The model Code of Practice says administrative controls and PPE "are the least effective at minimising risk because they do not control the hazard at the source and rely on human behaviour and supervision".[2] It allows them only as a back-up, a short-term measure, or a last resort.

Supervision is an administrative control. It fails the moment a phone rings, a sibling cries or an adult falls asleep, and those moments are normal. That is not a judgement on parents. It is the reason workplaces stopped relying on "be careful" decades ago. Supervise anyway, and put a barrier behind it.

Step 3

The Haddon matrix

The tool that joins workplace safety and child injury science.

William Haddon Jr argued that injuries are not bad luck. An injury comes from an agent, a form of energy such as heat, motion, electricity or a chemical, acting on a host, the person, in an environment. Haddon wrote that injuries "cannot occur without the action of specific agents", and that the patterns they form are not random.[5] The same idea runs a mine's fatal-hazard register and a hospital's child injury data.

Haddon set it out as a grid. Rows are three phases in time: pre-event (before the energy is released), event (while it is), post-event (after). Columns are the host, the agent, and the physical and social environment.[6] Each cell asks: what could we change here? Filling every cell stops a family fixating on one answer.

Worked example: a toddler and home water

PhaseHost (the child)Agent (water)Physical environmentSocial environment
Pre-event
stop the child reaching water		Toddlers are mobile, curious and drawn to water. Water familiarisation lessons; never treated as drown-proofing.Empty baths, buckets, paddling pools and eskies straight after use.Four-sided fence, self-closing and self-latching gate, nothing climbable within reach of the fence.One named adult watches the water at gatherings. Pool barrier laws and inspections.
Event
limit harm while in water		A small child can't lift out of water and slips under silently.Less depth means a faster rescue: shallow baths, no standing water.Adult within arm's reach in the bath. Clear line of sight to the pool from the house.Rule: the bath never pauses for the phone or the door. Take the child with you.
Post-event
survive and recover		Time without oxygen decides the outcome.Get the child out of the water first.CPR chart on the fence; phone kept near the pool; house number visible from the street for the ambulance.Every carer, grandparents included, trained in child CPR and calls 000.

Try the same grid for scalds: the host is a toddler's thin skin, the agent is heat, the environment is the bench edge and the bath tap, and the post-event cells hold 20 minutes of cool running water.

Step 4

The Swiss cheese model: why one control is never enough

James Reason pictured each defence as a slice of Swiss cheese.[7][8] Every slice has holes, and the holes move: a gate spring weakens, a carer gets distracted, a chair ends up next to the fence. Harm gets through only when the holes in every slice line up at once. Reason called the obvious slips active failures and the hidden weak spots that wait in the system latent conditions.[8]

Fence Self-closing gate Supervision CPR and 000 Hazard
The holes line up through three slices. The last slice, a carer who knows CPR, can still stop the worst outcome.

What the holes look like in real pool drownings

A Queensland study of 46 children under 5 who drowned in home pools between 2005 and 2015 found how each child got in: through a gate propped open in 28.3% of cases, a fence in disrepair (often a gate that didn't self-close and self-latch) in 19.6%, and no fence at all in 13.0%.[10] Most of those are holes in a control that existed. The fence was there; nobody verified it worked. That is the problem critical control management solves.

Step 5

Critical controls: the mining method

In 2015 the International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM) published a good practice guide for managing the most serious incidents on mine sites.[4] Its 2026 edition defines a critical control as "a control for a fatal hazard, which is crucial to directly preventing an unwanted event or mitigating the consequences of the event". Its absence or failure "would significantly increase the likelihood of the unwanted event or the severity of its consequence despite the existence of other controls".[9]

The method has three moves a family can copy:

  1. Name the events that kill or maim. ICMM calls them material unwanted events. At home: drowning, poisoning, a swallowed button battery, crushing by furniture, a deep scald.
  2. Pick the few controls that matter most. Not every safety habit. Only the ones whose failure lets the fatal event through.
  3. Verify them. Write down what "working" looks like, then check it on a schedule. ICMM defines verification as "the process of checking the extent to which the performance requirements set for a critical control are being met in practice".[4] A fence you haven't checked is a hope, not a control.
Print and stick on the fridge

Home critical controls checklist

Six controls that stand between a young child and a fatal or life-changing injury. Each has a performance standard (what working looks like) and a check. Tick it when it passes; fix it the same day when it fails.

Critical controlStopsWorking looks likeHow to checkHow often
Pool and spa barrierFour-sided fence with a self-closing, self-latching gateDrowningFence at least 1200 mm high; gaps no wider than 100 mm; gate opens outward and closes and latches by itself from every position; nothing climbable near the fence.[11]Open the gate fully, let go: it must shut and latch. Repeat from half open. Walk the fence and push each panel. Look for chairs, pot plants, branches and taps a child could climb.Monthly, and before every swim season
Medicines and chemicals lockedChild-resistant lock on the cupboardPoisoningEvery medicine, cleaner, dishwasher tablet and pool chemical behind a lock, in its original container.[12] Handbags and visitors' bags kept up high.Open the cupboard the way a child would: does the lock hold? Check bedside tables, the car and handbags for loose tablets.Weekly, and after shopping
Button battery compartments securedScrew-fastened or child-resistantSwallowed battery burnsEvery device with a button battery needs a tool or two separate movements to open.[15] Spare and flat batteries locked away.Gather remotes, scales, car keys, candles and toys. Try each cover by hand. Tape any that open; replace any that won't hold.Monthly, and when a new gadget arrives
Furniture and TVs anchoredStrapped or bolted to the wallCrush injuriesDrawers, bookcases, wardrobes and TVs fixed to a wall stud; heavy items on low shelves; the TV at the back of its unit or on the wall.[16]Pull gently forward at the top of each tall item. It should not rock. Check strap fixings after moving furniture.Every 3 months
Bathroom hot water at 50°C or lessTempering valve or limited heaterBath scaldsHot water at bathroom taps no hotter than 50°C. Systems installed before 5 August 1998 are likely to run hotter.[17]Run the bath hot tap for a minute and read it with a kitchen thermometer. Above 50°C, call a licensed plumber.Every 6 months
Safety switches (RCDs)On power circuits at the switchboardElectric shockAn RCD protects the circuits; the test button trips it.[2]Press each RCD's test button: it must trip. Reset. If it doesn't trip, call a licensed electrician.Every 6 months
Checked by
Date
Next check

Child Safety at Home · childsafety.omxus.com/safety-system.html · Poisons Information Centre 13 11 26 · Emergency 000. Check-frequency suggestions are ours; follow your state's rules where they differ.

Step 6

Take 5 at home

Mine and construction crews run a Take 5, a quick pre-task check, before starting a job, and a longer Job Safety Analysis (JSA) for bigger work. Both ask the same thing: what can hurt someone here, and what stops it? The home version takes under a minute.

The five questions

  1. Stop. What am I about to do, and who is with me?
  2. Look. Where is the energy here: water, heat, height, chemicals, power, traffic?
  3. Assess. What is the worst that could happen, and how likely is it today?
  4. Control. Is the barrier in place and working? If not, fix it or change the plan.
  5. Ready. If it goes wrong, do I know what to do and can I call 000?

Bath time

  1. Towel, nappy and clothes within reach before the water goes in.
  2. Cold first, then hot. Test with an elbow.
  3. Phone away; the door can wait.
  4. Older siblings are not supervisors.
  5. Lift the child out, then pull the plug straight away.

Cooking

  1. Where is the child? In a high chair, behind a gate, or with another adult.
  2. Back burners; handles turned in.
  3. Kettle and cords back from the edge.
  4. Hot drinks to the back of the bench.
  5. Knives and dishwasher tablets out of reach.

Visitors arriving

  1. Bags and coats go up high: they hold medicines.
  2. Who is watching the children, by name?
  3. Pool gate shut, and stays shut.
  4. Hot drinks and alcohol out of reach.
  5. Front door and driveway: who is watching for cars?

Someone else's house

  1. Walk through first: pool, water, stairs, balconies.
  2. Where are the medicines and cleaners?
  3. Any button batteries, unanchored furniture or blind cords?
  4. How hot is the bath water?
  5. Address saved, and nearest hospital known.
Step 7

A toolbox talk at home

On a work site, a toolbox talk is a short safety talk at the start of a shift, often held standing around the tools. At home it is five minutes, once a week, with every adult who looks after the children. Sunday dinner works.

The five-minute format

  1. Minute 1. Any near misses this week? No blame; just what happened.
  2. Minutes 2–3. One topic from the list.
  3. Minute 4. Check one critical control together.
  4. Minute 5. One action: who does what, by when. Write it on the log.

Eight starter topics

  1. Water: the bath, buckets and the pool gate. Who is the water-watcher this weekend?
  2. Medicines: where they live, the lock, and the Poisons Information Centre number (13 11 26).
  3. Button batteries: the device hunt and what to do if one is swallowed.
  4. Hot drinks and the kitchen: the back-of-the-bench rule.
  5. Falls: change tables, windows, balconies and stairs.
  6. Furniture and TVs: the pull test.
  7. Cars and driveways: who checks behind the car.
  8. The emergency plan: CPR, 000, and the address said aloud.
Step 8

Near misses are free lessons

A near miss is an event that could have caused harm but didn't: the toddler found at the open pool gate, the tablet found on the floor, the drawer unit that rocked. It shows a hole in a control without the price of an injury.

Heinrich's triangle, and its limits

In 1931 the safety engineer H.W. Heinrich published a triangle: for every 1 serious injury, 29 minor injuries and 300 events with no injury. In 1969 Frank Bird and George Germain proposed 1 major injury to 10 minor injuries, 30 property-damage events and 600 near misses.[18]

1 major injury10 minor injuries30 property damage600 near misses
Bird and Germain's ratio (1969), as tabled by Rebbitt (2014).[18] Treat it as a picture of an idea, not a law of nature.

The ratios are shaky. Heinrich's "original work and data are not available and no one has been able to verify or categorically refute his findings"; his definitions of serious and minor injuries are unclear. Since the 1990s, workplace injury rates have fallen much faster than fatality rates, which undercuts any fixed ratio, and the safety writer Fred Manuele has called Heinrich's ratio "a work of fiction".[18]

The lesson for a family: don't count near misses to predict injuries. Read each one for what it says about a fatal hazard. A spilt drink and an open pool gate are both near misses, but only the gate points at a critical control. That is the same shift mining made: from counting all incidents to verifying the controls on fatal hazards.[4]

Family near-miss log

DateWhat happenedCould have causedWhich control had a hole?Fix, who, by when
SatFound the pool gate resting on its latch, not latchedDrowningPool barrier: gate spring weakNew hinge spring. Sam. Sunday.
TueVisitor's handbag on the couch, open, with tablets insidePoisoningMedicines: no rule for visitors' bagsHook by the door for bags. Alex. This week.
 
 Example rows. Keep the log on the fridge beside the checklist and read it at the toolbox talk.
Step 9

Lead and lag indicators

Safety teams track two kinds of number. A lag indicator counts harm after it happens: injuries, hospital visits. A lead indicator counts the work that prevents harm: checks done, controls passing. ICMM notes that fatal events are rare and "as such, weak measures", and that lead indicators come from the results of critical control verification.[4] A family with no injuries this year has learnt little; a family that checked the pool gate 12 times and fixed it twice knows its fence works.

Lead (track these)Lag (hope these stay at zero)
Critical control checks done on time, out of 6Injuries needing first aid
Checks that passed first timeGP or emergency visits
Near misses logged, and fixed within a weekCalls to the Poisons Information Centre
Toolbox talks held this monthHospital admissions
Carers trained in child CPR
Sources

References

Every number on this page comes from these sources and is logged in our facts register.

  1. Safe Work Australia. Key Work Health and Safety Statistics Australia 2026. Released 12 October 2026. data.safeworkaustralia.gov.au/insights/key-whs-statistics-australia/latest-release
  2. Safe Work Australia. Model Code of Practice: How to manage work health and safety risks. November 2024. safeworkaustralia.gov.au/doc/model-code-practice-how-manage-work-health-and-safety-risks
  3. National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH). Hierarchy of Controls. 2024. cdc.gov/niosh/hierarchy-of-controls/about
  4. International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM). Health and Safety Critical Control Management: Good Practice Guide. London: ICMM, 2015. ISBN 978-1-909434-13-4. Copy hosted by the International Aluminium Institute (PDF)
  5. Haddon W Jr. Advances in the epidemiology of injuries as a basis for public policy. Public Health Reports 1980;95(5):411–421. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1422748
  6. Runyan CW. Using the Haddon matrix: introducing the third dimension. Injury Prevention 1998;4(4):302–307. doi:10.1136/ip.4.4.302. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1730420
  7. Reason J. Human Error. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990. doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139062367
  8. Reason J. Human error: models and management. BMJ 2000;320(7237):768–770. doi:10.1136/bmj.320.7237.768. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC1117770
  9. International Council on Mining and Metals (ICMM). Critical Control Management: Good Practice Guide, 2026 edition (replaces the 2015 guides). pimcore.icmm.com (PDF)
  10. Franklin RC, Peden AE. Improving pool fencing legislation in Queensland, Australia: attitudes and impact on child drowning fatalities. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 2017;14(12):1450. doi:10.3390/ijerph14121450. pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5750869
  11. Queensland Government. Tips for a safe pool. Updated 21 June 2022. qld.gov.au/housing/buying-owning-home/pool-safety/tips
  12. HealthyWA (WA Department of Health, with the WA Poisons Information Centre). Prevent poisoning in the home. healthywa.wa.gov.au/Articles/N_R/Prevent-poisoning-in-the-home
  13. Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Injuries in children and adolescents 2021–22. Updated 18 April 2024. aihw.gov.au/reports/injury/injuries-in-children-and-adolescents-2021-22
  14. Royal Life Saving Society – Australia. National Drowning Report 2025. royallifesaving.com.au/library/national-drowning-report/national-drowning-report-2025
  15. Queensland Government. Button batteries. qld.gov.au: product safety, button batteries
  16. Royal Children's Hospital Melbourne (reprinting The Guardian). The tipping point: how to safeguard your home from falling furniture. 11 August 2021. blogs.rch.org.au/news/the-tipping-point-how-to-safeguard-your-home-from-falling-furniture
  17. Plumbing Connection, quoting the Victorian Building Authority. Keep kids protected from scalding hot water this winter. 12 July 2022. plumbingconnection.com.au/keep-kids-protected-from-scalding-hot-water-this-winter
  18. Rebbitt D. Pyramid power: a new view of the great safety pyramid. Professional Safety (American Society of Safety Engineers), September 2014:30–34. Includes Heinrich (1931) and Bird and Germain (1969) ratios. aeasseincludes.assp.org (PDF)

Start with one control this week

Print the checklist, check the pool gate or the medicine lock tonight, and hold the first toolbox talk on Sunday.

Go to the checklist See every danger