What work health and safety duties does the owner of a tiling business have in Australia?

What work health and safety duties does the owner of a tiling business have in Australia?

Under Australian work health and safety law, the owner of a tiling business is treated as a person conducting a business or undertaking, a PCBU, and carries a primary duty of care for everyone affected by the work. This covers crew on the tools, subbies brought in for a bathroom renovation, and anyone else on site such as the builder's other trades or the homeowner walking through a wet area mid-job. The duty is broad and it sits with the business itself, not something that can be handed off by passing a job to a subcontractor.

According to Safe Work Australia, a PCBU has a primary duty of care to ensure the health and safety of workers while they are at work, and of others who may be affected by the work, such as site visitors. Duties of a PCBU So far as reasonably practicable, that duty covers safe systems of work, safe plant such as wet saws and mixers, safe handling of substances like adhesive and grout, adequate facilities on site, and proper training and supervision for anyone cutting, mixing or lifting on the job. Safe Work Australia also notes that health under the model Act includes psychological health, which matters on jobs where a tiler is working alone in a tight shower recess or under pressure from a builder's program.

What does WHS law say about silica dust from cutting large format tile?

Cutting porcelain, large format tile and some stone products creates crystalline silica dust, and WHS law treats that processing as something a tiling business must control, not something to manage with a mask and good intentions. Safe Work Australia's guidance on crystalline silica substances sets out that a PCBU must not carry out, or direct or allow a worker to carry out, that kind of processing unless it is controlled. Working with crystalline silica substances

Where cutting tile counts as high risk construction work, a safe work method statement is required so everyone on a renovation site, including the builder and other subbies, understands how the dust will be managed. WorkSafe Queensland's guidance on processing crystalline silica substances explains that a silica risk control plan or safe work method statement must be prepared and kept for inspection, and that training must be given to anyone carrying out or exposed to that processing, with records retained. Regulation on processing crystalline silica substances The detail changes by state. Safe Work Australia's broader silica guidance notes that in Western Australia, health monitoring for exposed workers uses a different scan to the one used elsewhere, so a tiler working across state lines on a renovation cannot assume one state's process applies in the next. Working with silica and silica containing products

Who inside a tiling business actually carries these duties?

The duty does not sit only with the business on paper, it sits personally with whoever directs it, and separately with every person on the tools. Safe Work Australia's interpretive guide on the officer duty explains that section 27 of the model WHS Act places a duty on an officer of a PCBU to exercise due diligence to ensure the PCBU complies with its duties. Officer duty interpretive guide For a tiling business run through a company, that means a director cannot simply assume the foreman or office has it covered.

SafeWork NSW describes due diligence as including reasonable steps to keep safety knowledge current, understand the risks in the work, make sure resources and processes exist and are actually used, and ensure hazard reports are acted on promptly. Directors and officers Workers carry a duty too, to take reasonable care for their own safety and not put others at risk, which matters on a job where a tiler, a plumber and an electrician may all be working in the same wet area at once.

This is general information, not legal, tax or employment advice. Check your own situation with the body named here or a qualified adviser.

How do you build these obligations into your square metre rate or day rate?

You already price materials, labour and breakage into every bathroom or kitchen quote, so dust extraction, PPE, training time and the extra care safe manual handling of screed and adhesive adds deserve the same treatment, not a guess folded into overhead. If a quote is built from a square metre rate or a day rate that assumes the old way of working, cutting large format tile dry on a bench with no extraction, lifting bags of screed without a plan, the margin on paper looks fine while the real return on that job quietly shrinks.

Greg's view, built from years coaching trade businesses, is that proper process protects the job rather than slowing it down. Rushing waterproofing to save a day, or skipping dust control to hit a builder's program, tends to cost more in rework, warranty callbacks and downtime than doing it properly costs in time. The number that tells the truth here is the gross margin on each individual job, not the average across the month, because a safety cost buried in overhead can hide inside a business that looks profitable while specific bathrooms are quietly losing money.

How can AI agents help you carry this paperwork without it eating your week?

An AI agent is software that does a job the way you would do it yourself, using your prices, your wording and your rules, so instead of chasing training records, safe work method statements and PPE checks between quotes, the agent keeps them moving in the background. For a tiling business, that can mean an agent that tracks which tilers on the crew hold current silica training, flags a job that needs a safe work method statement before it starts, and keeps those records somewhere a builder or regulator can be shown them.

This works best as a data first approach: the agent reads your own job and crew records rather than a generic template, so the reminders and records match how your business actually runs its bathrooms and renovations, not a blanket version built for every trade at once. AI agents do not remove the duty, that still sits with you and any officers of the business, but they can stop the paperwork from being the thing that gets skipped when the week gets busy.

Where can you check the current rules?

• Duties of a PCBU: Safe Work Australia's explanation of the primary duty every tiling business owner carries as a PCBU.
• Working with crystalline silica substances: Safe Work Australia's guidance on controlling silica dust when cutting tile and stone.
• Working with silica and silica containing products: national guidance covering safe work method statements and state differences in health monitoring.
• Regulation on processing crystalline silica substances: WorkSafe Queensland's rules on silica risk control plans and training.
• Officer duty interpretive guide: Safe Work Australia's explanation of the due diligence duty on company officers.
• Directors and officers: SafeWork NSW's description of what due diligence looks like in practice.
• Personal protective equipment (PPE): Safe Work Australia's duties around issuing and maintaining PPE.
• Working on a construction site: Safe Work Australia's explanation of White Card induction requirements on site.

How does Data First Coaching approach this?

Data First Coaching, created by Greg Allan, starts from the owner's own numbers rather than a general checklist. For a tiling business, that means looking at what each job, not the average, actually returns once training, PPE, dust control and the time safe handling takes are counted against it, because that is where a WHS cost that looks small on its own quietly becomes a margin problem across a month of bathrooms. The Trade Business Intelligence reads that data alongside years of coaching trade businesses to find where the real gap starts. The how, working out what that looks like for a specific tiling business, is worked through inside the Academy, with members, because the Trade Business Intelligence is powered by every member who is open minded, innovative and willing to share.