The legal responsibility to identify and correct health and safety hazards rests on the shoulders of all  workplace parties (employers, owners, workers, supervisors, contractors, self-employed people and suppliers).

The OHS Division supports workplace parties in fulfilling their legal responsibility by:

• Helping workplace parties understand their responsibilities;
• Support occupational health committees, worker representatives and supervisors/managers in resolving concerns;
• Inspecting workplaces;
• Investigate incidents including serious injuries and fatalities; and
• Enforcing compliance with the Occupational Health and Safety Act and Regulations.

Finding and controlling occupational health and safety hazards should not be left to occupational health officers. It is not their  job to find the hazards for the workplace parties. When they do come across hazards, it means the workplace parties are not fulfilling their legal health and safety responsibilities.

When Occupational Health Officers do inspections, they are required to take the occupational health committee worker co-chair, worker representative or another worker with them. If the workplace parties have not been doing their job properly and a problem has been missed or ignored, the worker should report the problem to the officer.

The OHS Division has three major enforcement tools:

1. Officer Reports of inspections
2. Notices of Contravention, and the ability to stop work: and
3. Prosecution 

1.  Officer Reports
Officer Reports are factual accounts of the Occupational Health Officer’s inspection and an assessment of a particular workplace at that point in time. They are a written record, not an order for corrective action. An officer may use an Officer's Report to record such things as complaints or concerns, action taken to address concerns, follow-up with corrective actions, or to recommend action that goes beyond minimum legal requirements.

2.  Notices of Contravention
An officer uses a Notice of Contravention to:

• identify a violation of the Act or Regulations
• specify the corrective action to be taken and the date that action is to be done by and,
• require a progress report on the correction to be submitted to the OHS Division and to the committee, worker representative or, where neither of those are in place, to workers, within seven days of the deadline

When Occupational Health Officers come across a serious risk to health and safety, they must use the Notice of Contravention to order the cessation of work that involves a serious risk to workers. The "cessation of work" order remains in effect until the officer is satisfied that the risk has been dealt with. The Occupational Health Officer then withdraws the order.

3.  Prosecution
The OHS Division considers prosecution when:

• a contravention of health and safety requirements results in a death or serious injury
• a person repeatedly refuses to comply with a Notice of Contravention
• a person consistently and flagrantly contravenes health and safety requirements