Drugs, alcohol and work are not a cocktail we recommend. In your small business, we suggest you keep things clean from the very start with a suite of procedures and best practice in place.
If you’re a numbers person, you’ll be interested and not a little alarmed at the statistics released this month by the Australian Institute for Health and Welfare (AIHW), telling us that around one in two-hundred people in this country sought treatment for alcohol and drug use in 2014–15.
For the last ten years alcohol, cannabis, amphetamines and heroin have been the drugs causing most concern. The Institute’s spokesperson Tim Beard advises that for their clients seeking treatment aged thirty and over, alcohol was the most commonly used drug, while for clients aged twenty-nine and under, it was cannabis.
Some of those people work. It’s possible they work for you or might do so at some point. Are you ready to handle the consequences?
Let’s not be naïve. This is clearly an issues that touches workplace culture both directly and indirectly.
The Australian Drug Foundation reports that alcohol and drugs cost Australian workplaces an estimated $6 billion per year in lost productivity, with 2.5 million days lost annually.
The cost to co-workers is just as significant. One in ten workers say they have experienced the negative effects of a co-worker’s misuse of alcohol. That might include reduced capacity in doing their job, causing an accident or near miss. There can be an expectation that colleagues will cover for them, even extending their own hours of work to do so.
Whatever the size of an organisation, all employers have a legal obligation to address alcohol and drug related issues in the workplace. Reasonable or practicable steps must be taken to ensure the health and safety of all staff, as well as contractors or clients.
Which brings us back to our recommendation that you keep things clean from the start.
Managing alcohol or drug related issues in retrospect, with no supporting policy or go-to guide, is complex, stressful and costly.
At #HR we know that being proactive and having best practice in place from start-up onwards is most certainly the way to go.
There are many resources available to help employers implement best practice. Safe Work Australia is an excellent place to start looking for on-line resources governed by Australian legislation, as well as the Australian Drug Foundation for documentation that’s useful when compiling your procedures.
If you have any doubts at all, contact a professional like #HR, who will be able to support you through this process. We are an influence upon whom you should be counting.
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