Tips on how to comply with the new WHS (Mines) Regulations

A part of our Exemplar Global auditing scope is that we are certified to conduct Regulatory Occupational Health and Safety Compliance Audits.
While most organisations ask for ISO 45001 audits, due to the recent Work Health and Safety (WHS) legislative change, we are being asked to conduct WHS legal compliance inspections of late.
One mining client requested a WHS legal compliance inspection against the new Work Health and Safety (Mines) Regulations 2022 (WA).  With no guide to use, we ploughed through the 600-page document and created a bespoke inspection tool.
While onsite the inspection tool was easy to use, we did not use any software to assist, the outcome produced clear gaps, which we risk-ranked and easily communicated with the client.
Since then, DMIRS has produced a regulation comparison table which is really helpful and will influence further improvements to our inspection tool. In addition, DMIRS has released numerous documents on how to implement mine safety management systems which, while not templates, will assist small mines comply with the new regulations.
We believe the most important part of the process, is how to communicate your findings, ensuring it is not too overwhelming for your audience, so they do not feel that they want to throw the towel in, which we have heard more than once since the new WHS regulations came into effect on the 31 March 2022.