When a support worker climbs into their own car to drive a client to a medical appointment, that vehicle becomes a workplace under the eyes of the law, whether or not anyone involved thinks of it that way. Known as ‘grey fleet’, the use of privately owned vehicles for work-related purposes is common across aged care, though it isn’t confined to client transport. Under the Work Health and Safety Act 2011 (NSW), there is no distinction between a company-owned vehicle and a personal one used for business purposes, which means organisations carry the same duty of care regardless of who holds the registration papers, and regardless of what that vehicle happens to be carrying.
Duty of care obligations
Organisations must ensure, so far as reasonably practicable, the health and safety of workers who use grey fleet vehicles for work. In practice, this covers a wide set of obligations: confirming vehicles are safe, roadworthy and fit for purpose, checking that drivers hold a valid licence and are competent behind the wheel, and identifying and managing the WHS (workplace health and safety) risks that come with vehicle use.
Safe driving policies and procedures need to sit alongside proper training and guidance, while workers should be consulted directly about the road safety risks they face and the controls put in place to manage them. Ongoing monitoring of compliance, together with systems for reporting, investigating and correcting incidents, rounds out what a genuinely robust approach looks like.
A commercial cleaning perspective
For Associated Cleaning executive general manager Troy Stahlhut, the exposure looks a little different again. “Most of the cleaners engaged by the business are straight-to-site, making their own way in and working a single location,” he says. “But a good portion of the workforce moves between sites carrying equipment, chemicals and tools, which is where the grey fleet becomes an everyday reality rather than an occasional one.
“Everything we do is risk-based, so the grey fleet gets the same lens as any other hazard,” he explains. “Vehicle checks aren’t run as a separate exercise, but sit inside the safety inspections already underway, with inspectors reviewing how gear and chemicals are stored and moved safely, and flagging any concerns with a vehicle’s maintenance or insurance while they’re there. Insurance records are then kept on file.”
Visibility is where the grey fleet enters a grey area. A worker’s own car doesn’t get recorded or monitored the way company plant and equipment would, so it sits outside the regular maintenance reporting even though, in practice, it often functions as an extension of the cleaner’s store.
“The same housekeeping standard we’d apply to a cleaners’ room or cupboard on-site should apply to the boot, even though it’s the one space we can’t easily see,” Stahlhut says, adding that the risk runs beyond safety alone, like a cleaner turning up to a client’s premises in a poorly kempt vehicle carries a brand impact, fair or not.
Rather than overhaul induction processes, the business has added grey fleet questions to the inspection and auditing tools managers already use. The bigger issue, in Stahlhut’s view, is what those audits look at in the first place.
“Too many commercial cleaning companies build their auditing regimen entirely around client-side outcomes, checking whether a site looks clean and passes a walkthrough, without ever getting to the root cause sitting behind it,” he says. “Audit only the outcome. and you’ll keep fixing the same problems. Audit the practice, and you fix the cause.”
External venues and labour hire
Support work frequently takes clients beyond the home, to medical appointments, social events, parks or other locations, and each of these external venues becomes a workplace under WHS law for the duration of the visit, including the travel to and from it. Providers, support workers and clients or their representatives all share responsibility for taking reasonable steps within their control to keep these visits safe. Labour hire arrangements add a further layer, with agency workers employed directly by a PCBU (person conducting a business or undertaking), such as an aged care nursing agency, then on-hired to a host PCBU, meaning both organisations carry obligations under WHS legislation.
Grey fleet risk rarely gets the same attention as fixed-site hazards, yet whether the vehicle in question is transporting a client or a boot full of chemicals, it deserves a seat at the table alongside every other WHS priority.
