An employer’s OHS obligations take precedence when an employee shows up at work under the influence of alcohol, but a regime that combines a clear policy, counselling and discipline ensures best practice, according to leading workplace lawyer, Michael Tooma.
When employees show signs of intoxication, says Tooma, employers have an overriding obligation to remove them from the workplace to ensure their safety and that of other workers.
Even in a white-collar environment, he told Labour Solutions Australia, a worker affected by alcohol can be exposed to risks to their health and safety, for instance around workplace equipment, access and egress to the site, and in the carpark.
But where safety risks aren’t apparent there are sound HR reasons to take action, he says, and managers don’t need to wait for evidence that the person’s work is affected.
Risks can potentially flow from an impaired worker providing advice to a client, dealing with customers or making decisions in their work, he says, “so the employer has to be mindful of that and manage those risks accordingly”.
“An employee has to be fit for work, and that’s an obligation that is at the heart of a contract of employment. If an employee quite clearly is significantly impaired by alcohol, say even after lunch, the employer can initiate some disciplinary action in relation to that, and enforce the position that they have to be fit to perform work.”
Alcohol policies provide “safe ground”
Workplace alcohol tests should only be conducted where they are clearly provided for in a workplace policy and employees understand the process, Tooma says.
Overall, when dealing with alcohol issues at work, employers are on “much safer ground” if they have a drug and alcohol policy, he says.
“Whether or not that policy requires testing depends on the context. If it is a heavy industry where safety risks are obvious, then that justifies a testing regime, but in any event, certainly a prohibition on being affected by alcohol is a minimum in terms of what a policy should have.”
It is much more difficult to discipline an employee for being alcohol-affected at work without a policy in place, he says.
Counselling
An employer can’t direct a worker to get counselling for alcohol addiction, Tooma says, “but you can certainly offer counselling”.
A “best practice” approach, he says, combines a policy, counselling and disciplinary options if the behaviour is repeated.
“Best practice really mandates that kind of escalation, so that you’re not capturing within a disciplinary regime a person who may have an addiction, without affording them an appropriate opportunity to rid themselves of that addiction and get to the heart of the problem.”
Help culture critical
According to health and wellbeing advisor Chris Parker, alcohol is rarely taken seriously as a workplace issue unless it results in an accident or death.
He says employee assistance programs (EAPs) are important, but employers can do more.
He told Labour Solutions Australia that employers should look for warning signs of alcohol dependency and encourage workers to seek assistance.
Line managers are often ill-equipped to deal with requests for help, he says, so employers need to provide “multiple routes to multiple types of assistance”.
“Engaging a support worker who is not involved in line management but can advise managers and encourage employees to ask for help and then provide practical support through the process will make the EAP more effective,” he says.
Employers must then be patient.
“Be prepared to give the person time off for counselling,” he says, “and be aware that, for some time, they might be far from the model employee.”
