Is a Take 5 a Safe Work Australia requirement?

No — 'Take 5' is not a Safe Work Australia term. A direct search of safeworkaustralia.gov.au for 'take 5' returns no results, and it isn't named in the WHS Act, the Regulations, or any Code of Practice. It's industry and site practice used by principal contractors, miners and safety-software vendors, not a legal requirement.

What does the law actually require before starting a task?

Your employer's general risk-management duty (ss17-19, regs 34-35 — identify and eliminate hazards so far as reasonably practicable) and your own duty as a worker to take reasonable care for your health and safety (s28). A Take 5 is one informal way to meet your s28 duty in the moment.

Does a Take 5 replace a SWMS or JSA?

No — explicitly not. A Take 5 is a last-line personal check, not a documented risk-management system. High-risk construction work and similarly hazardous tasks still need a formal Safe Work Method Statement (SWMS) or Job Safety Analysis (JSA) completed first; the Take 5 is your final check once that's in place, not a substitute for it.

What are the Take 5 steps?

Stop, look, assess, manage, proceed — an industry convention, not a legislated sequence. Stop before starting; look around for hazards; assess what could go wrong and how bad it could be; manage any hazard you find; only proceed once it's genuinely safe to.

Take 5 Safety Checklist

Run and record a Take 5 pre-start safety check — stop, look, assess, manage, proceed — with a filed record for each task.

Last verified: 26 July 2026

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Take 5 Safety Checklist

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