Mobile plant and equipment such as forklifts, loaders, excavators, EWPs, cranes, service vehicles, and agricultural machinery are essential to operations across the construction, mining, logistics, manufacturing, and agriculture industries. They also present a concentrated set of risks: high-severity personal injuries, property damage, business interruption, and regulatory penalties.
Plant and equipment remain a leading contributor to serious work-related injuries and deaths across Australia. As such, owners and operators must understand and comply with the Work Health and Safety (WHS) legislative framework and relevant Australian Standards governing their use, inspection, and maintenance.
Why mobile plant risk is different
Mobile plant combines high mass, kinetic energy, and complex human-machine interaction, often in dynamic workplace environments including mixed traffic zones, adverse weather, night shifts and confined spaces.
Common loss drivers include:
- People: Competency, fatigue, distraction, poor supervision.
- Plant: Mechanical defects, missing guards, unverified modifications, overdue maintenance.
- Place: Congested layouts, poor segregation, unstable ground, slopes, blind spots.
- Process: Informal work methods, insufficient pre-start checks.
- External factors: Contractors, public road interfaces, utilities, and environmental conditions.
Understanding these drivers enables targeted controls rather than generic, box ticking measures.
Legal duties & Australian Standards
Under WHS legislation, a person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) has a primary duty of care to ensure, so far as is reasonably practicable, the health and safety of workers and others who may be affected by work activities. This includes a legal obligation to eliminate risks, or, where elimination is not reasonably practicable, to minimise risks as far as is realistically possible.
In relation to mobile plant and equipment, these risks commonly include:
- Physical contact with moving or rotating parts
- Plant overturning or operator ejection
- Objects falling onto operators or bystanders
- Collision with people, vehicles, or structures
- Mechanical or hydraulic failures
- Poor ergonomic design or unsafe operator positioning.
A failure to proactively manage these risks can not only lead to severe injury or even, loss of life, but a business may be exposed to regulatory enforcement action, prosecution, and reputational damage as a result.
Maintenance and inspection
Effective maintenance regimes are a cornerstone of plant and equipment risk management. Maintenance programs must be based on:
- Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) manuals and recommended service intervals
- Legislated inspection and verification requirements as well as the applicable Australian Standards relevant to the specific plant type. For example, Australian Standard AS 2550 mandates 10 Year Major Inspections for certain cranes, EWPs, and telehandlers.
Ignoring or deferring these requirements significantly increases the likelihood of mechanical failure and creates serious compliance exposures, particularly in the event of a serious incident or regulatory investigation.
Insurance implications
From an insurance perspective, compliance is not optional.
All insurers impose policy conditions requiring insured plant and machinery to be used legally, maintained and operated in compliance with Australian Standards and maintained and operated in accordance with manufacturer and distributor instructions.
A breach of these conditions can have severe financial consequences. Insurers may deny claims, reduce claim settlements, or even void cover entirely. This can result in uninsured losses for damage to the plant itself, as well as exposure to uninsured third-party liability claims stemming from personal injury or property damage.
Conversely, organisations that demonstrate proactive, well documented compliance often benefit from:
- Reduced frequency and severity of incidents
- Improved policy terms and pricing
- Faster, more efficient claims resolution
- Stronger defensibility in liability claims and regulatory scrutiny.
Recent regulatory change – earthmoving equipment used as cranes
A significant regulatory change has recently been introduced in Western Australia relating to earthmoving machinery used for lifting operations. Earthmoving equipment such as excavators can be fitted with lifting points or attachments to suspend loads, effectively enabling them to perform crane-like functions.
From August 2025, WorkSafe Western Australia requires operators to hold an appropriate High Risk Work Licence (HRWL) when using earthmoving machinery as a crane where the safe working load (SWL) exceeds 3 tonnes:
- CN HRWL – for nonslewing mobile crane operations exceeding 3 tonnes SWL.
- C2 HRWL – for slewing mobile crane operations exceeding 3 tonnes SWL.
In addition to holding the correct HRWL, operators must be competent for the tasks undertaken and have appropriate training, instruction, and experience. Australian Standard AS 1418.8 provides guidance on the special requirements for earthmoving equipment used as a crane. Where the primary use of plant is craneage work, compliance with both AS 1418.5 and AS 1418.8 is generally considered as a basic requirement. Further guidance on lifting points and latching mechanisms is available in AS 13031.
Recommended risk management tools
To effectively manage mobile plant risk and support compliance, businesses should implement the following controls:
- Safe Work Method Statements (SWMS) that clearly identify hazards, assess risks, and describe how control measures will be implemented should they be required
- Accessible operating instructions, such as manuals or QR code linked guidance on the machinery.
- Appropriate personal protective equipment (PPE) for operators and ground workers.
- Documented prestart inspections completed before each use.
- Operator competency verification, including licences, qualifications, and task specific training.
- Comprehensive record keeping for all of the above to demonstrate compliance and support insurance claims in the event of an incident.
Documentation is critical, not only to meet legal obligations, but also to establish defensible evidence for insurers and regulators should an incident occur.
Conclusion
Mobile plant and equipment present some of the highest safety and financial risks in Australian workplaces. From an insurance perspective, compliance with legal frameworks directly influences insurability, claims outcomes, and financial resilience. Businesses that invest in structured, proactive plant safety measures not only protect their people and assets but also reduce the likelihood of uninsured losses and regulatory exposure. Compliance with legal requirements is therefore not just a statutory obligation, it is a critical component of sustainable risk management and improved insurance outcomes.
