Live Performance Australia have recently released two important documents towards ensuring safe workplaces in the live performance and events industries: The Safety Guidelines for the Entertainment Industry, and the Australian Live Performance Industry Code of Practice: Discrimination, Harassment, Sexual Harassment and Bullying.

“In a positive safety culture, everyone accepts personal responsibility for ensuring their health and safety and that of others. Supervisors and managers see health and safety as important and the things they do demonstrate their commitment to health and safety.”

The new Safety Guidelines replace the Employer Guide to OHS 2014, and comprehensively cover the conditions we can expect from the companies that employ us, and the conditions we are expected to uphold in our capacity as managers in the workplace – to maintain in every respect a safe working environment for ourselves and our team.

The objective of the new Safety Guidelines is to promote best practice in delivering safe events and safe working environments, and raise awareness of the practical and legislative requirements to manage health and safety issues appropriately.

The Safety Guidelines cover audience and crowd management, safety in dealing with rigging, chemicals, electrics, special effects, automation, stage machinery, hazardous materials, and much more. Given the sometimes ropey conditions APDG Members are expected to work under in some fringe venues and even sometimes in mainstream subsidised companies (working at height alone in at 3:00am, dying costumes in unventilated spaces, loading heavy props and costumes unassisted, for example are not uncommon dangers) the Guidelines make for essential reading. You can find them here.

The Live Performance Code of Practice meanwhile affirms all of those values so recently and distressingly brought to our attention in the media – our shared responsibility to maintain a workplace free of discrimination, harassment, sexual harassment and bullying.

Live Performance Australia is seeking our input as theatre-makers into the framing of these guidelines. You can direct any comments or feedback to Kim Tran, Director of Policy and Governance ktran@liveperformance.com.au.

Many Members would also be aware of the efforts of our union the MEAA on this front, with the results from their 2017 survey confirming there is still a lot of work to be done in changing attitudes to harassment and bullying. The MEAA have developed a set of resources for our industry, and these can be found on the MEAA website.

On a positive note the MEAA survey summarises:

• 80% say we need to empower cast and crew to speak out when they feel uncomfortable,
• 77% say having effective, easily accessible procedures and policies in place is crucial
• 71% say it is important to knowing who to report a problem to
• 70% say appropriate conduct should be discussed in the induction
• 2% say that recipients should grow thicker skin.

There is a lot of energy going into transforming attitudes and forming strategies for building safer workplaces. To this end APDG Live Performance Workgroup member Anna Tregloan represented the APDG at a recent industry forum in Melbourne where both large and small major theatre companies and allied theatre workers met to formulate strategies to deal with bullying, harassment and sexual harassment. This was an artist-led initiative, acknowledging how important it is that artists continue to be empowered in this conversation. There was strong collegial support for the LPA agreement, with codes of behaviour and procedures for reporting and managing based on the LPA Code. Anna was able to represent the special needs of designers whose work processes are quite different to those of performers, stage management and directors in the rehearsal room. The Joint Statement issued by the forum reads in part:

“The participants of the forum have agreed to be the custodians of change. They have made a long-term combined commitment to create workplaces free of harassment and bullying; workplaces that are safe, where policies and procedures are clearly communicated and understood, where avenues for complaint and redress are available which respect the rights of all parties involved. The forum discussed the success of the theatre sector in changing the culture around the management of physical workplace health and safety and agreed that the lessons of this change provide confidence that a similar shift can be affected in the prevention of unwanted behaviours in the theatrical workplace.” You can use the hashtag #safetheatres and find the Joint Statement here.

The APDG applauds Live Performance Australia, the MEAA and companies and employers who are taking both sets of Guidelines into their practice –instituting effective safety inductions and reporting policies and procedures. The APDG encourages all Members to incorporate the new guidance material into our work, health and safety plans, as well as promoting the use of the Guidelines to our co-workers.

Stephen Curtis
APDG Live Performance Workgroup Coordinator