A remuneration survey by Safesearch, covering 1,334 individual roles across 168 organisations, has found Workplace Health and Safety (WHS) and Health, Safety and Environment (HSE) employees are benefiting from increased demand for safety services.

Safesearch general manager Aaron Neilson suggests the infrastructure boom has been particularly advantageous for WHS and HSE workers in New South Wales and Queensland, where the economy is seeing recalibration following the mining boom.

“New South Wales safety remuneration has increased across all levels, which reflects the strength of the market, while resource-heavy states Queensland and Western Australia are showing signs of recovery from the mining downturn,” he said. “These latter two states have shown resilience during the mining collapse and have shifted their attention to other sectors, where demand for safety workers is high.”

The survey also showed that entry-level roles continue to be in high-demand, with WHS/HSE officer roles increasing 9.1% year-on-year.

“Despite the downturn in industries that typically drive demand for junior staffers, we have seen no reprieve in demand for officer and coordinator roles. This reflects a maturing and advancement of the industry in Australia,” Neilson said.

Additionally, there has been a spike in demand for environmental roles which is reflected in the average salary increase of 12.28% cent across all levels.

“There is a lot of focus on environmental compliance and a push towards sustainable practices across a wide cross-section of industries,” Neilson said.

“Policy changes and the World Climate Summit in late 2015, has prompted conversation on how industries can operate with less impact to the environment. Consequently, this has driven demand for environmental roles and consequently an increase in salaries across all levels. As more attention is placed on these areas, we are anticipating further growth in the environmental and sustainability job sectors.”

With the exception of Queensland, where there has been a decrease of 6.5%, there is an upward trend for remuneration at officer level within the WHS/HSE sectors. Average TARs in Victoria, New South Wales and Western Australia are up 8.8%, 4.1%, 2% and 12.8% year-on-year, respectively.

The survey also asked senior health and safety professionals a range of qualitative questions on the challenges faced by their organisation.