WorkSafe CEO quits amid $470m budget raid

January 11, 2012

The head of Victoria's workplace safety authority has announced his resignation weeks after the Victorian government ripped more than $470 million from its budget.

Greg Tweedly, who has been chief executive of WorkSafe since 2003, announced his resignation to his staff today.

The move comes less than a month after the state government announced in a revised budget outlook that $471.5 million would be taken from Victoria's workplace insurance scheme over four years and funnelled into general revenues.

But a state government spokeswoman said the resignation did not have any link to recent budgetary changes and stressed that it was "entirely Mr Tweedly's decision" to leave at this time.

The revised budget, announced in December, was designed to slash costs and prop up revenues to keep the government in surplus.

The decision meant 3600 public sector jobs would vanish while motorists would be slugged with higher registration fees.

The WorkCover Authority, which is funded by employers through premiums to insure against accidents, will have to hand over its profits until 2014-15.

The state opposition has blasted the budgetary plans and called the changes to WorkCover a cash grab.

"Mr Tweedly has obviously served WorkCover well in the nine years he's been with the organisation," opposition spokesman Robin Scott said.

"But his departure will mean it will be even more difficult for WorkSafe to recover from the half a billion dollars being ripped out of the authority."

A WorkSafe spokeswoman said budgetary changes had no bearing on Mr Tweedly's decision and that he had been thinking about it for some time.

He is expected to stay on with the authority until a replacement can be found and hired, likely by July.

AAP