Safe Work Australia has appointed its Chief Information Officer to the role of AI Accountable Official and the Chief Operating Officer to the role of Chief AI Officer. (Template language)
Safe Work Australia’s Approach to AI Adoption and Use
We are committed to exploring the safe and responsible adoption of AI to improve service delivery, policy outcomes and productivity while ensuring public trust is maintained.
Safe Work Australia currently uses AI to:
- support corporate and enabling functions.
- provide analytics for insights where AI identifies, produces or understands insights via comprehensive data analysis, predictive modelling, and/or reporting tools.
- analyse policies and legal documents to support policy development that is consistent with existing laws.
Safe Work Australia has processes in place to ensure our AI use is appropriately governed and our AI access and usage is monitored.
Prior to gaining access to AI, staff must complete mandatory training.
For further information or enquiries about Safe Work Australia’s adoption of AI, you can contact us directly at businessservices@swa.gov.au
This statement will be reviewed annually when we make a significant change to our approach to AI, or when any new factor impacts this statement.Also appears in 3 other agenciesAFMAANMMDVSC
Safe Work Australia is developing its maturity and potential use cases for AI. While those use cases remain under consideration, AI usage is limited at the Agency.
When discussing AI, we apply the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) definition:
An AI system is a machine-based system that, for explicit or implicit objectives, infers, from the input it receives, how to generate outputs such as predictions, content, recommendations, or decisions that can influence physical or virtual environments. Different AI systems vary in their levels of autonomy and adaptiveness after deployment.
AI use
Safe Work Australia has very limited AI usage. Any changes to our AI use will result in an update to this Transparency Statement.
Safe Work Australia uses AI to perform research and analytics for insights to support our policy and legal functions. We have an AI enabled application that can analyse large volumes of legal documentation to perform first level research, and an AI enabled application that aggregates data inputs for consumption.
Usage Patterns
Safe Work Australia employs AI in the following way:
- Analytics for insights: where AI identifies, produces or understands insights about a material via comprehensive data analysis, predictive modelling and/or reporting tools.
Domains
Our AI applications focus on:
- Policy and Legal Functions: Analyses policies and legal documents to support policy development that is consistent with existing laws.
Ensuring Responsible Use
- Safe Work Australia safeguards against risks and ensures responsible AI use through releasing an annual AI Transparency Statement to provide visibility on how AI is used and managed.
Public interaction and impact
We do not propose to use AI where the public may directly interact with or be significantly impacted by it.
Monitoring AI effectiveness and negative impacts
Training and assistance
All staff have access to training on the appropriate use of AI services and are encouraged to report concerns to the AI Accountable Official.
Compliance
We will only use AI services in accordance with applicable legislation, regulations, frameworks and policies. Safe Work Australia is committed to adapting our AI systems and advice as needed to align with evolving legislation, ethical standards, and public expectations.
Policy for the responsible use of AI in government
We comply with all mandatory requirements of the Digital Transformation Agency (DTA) Policy for the responsible use of AI in government.
Accountable official
The Group Manager, Corporate & Engagement was designated as the accountable official on 9 December 2024.
AI transparency statement
The AI transparency statement was first published to our website on 28 February 2025.
The statement will be reviewed annually or when significant changes occur.
AI contact
For questions about this statement or for further information on the Agency’s usage of AI, please contact businessservices@swa.gov.au.
Statement text © Safe Work Australia, reproduced for transparency tracking (most agency content is CC BY 4.0 — check the original for specifics).