Most demolition SWMS open with an excavator and a list of attachments. Then comes a sequence that amounts to work from the top down. That document describes the job. It does not control it.
Two questions decide whether the crew goes home. What is holding this structure up right now, and what sits inside the material coming down. A demolition SWMS that answers neither leaves the two biggest killers on the job uncontrolled.
This post walks that chain, from classification and notification through to dust at the boundary. Along the way it shows where each control belongs in the document.
What the WHS Regulation asks of a demolition SWMS
Classification comes first, because it decides whether a SWMS is mandatory at all. Regulation 291 lists the categories of high risk construction work. Paragraph (c) catches demolition of a load-bearing element, or of any element tied to the physical integrity of the structure. Paragraph (d) catches work that involves, or is likely to involve, the disturbance of asbestos. Most demolition jobs trigger both. Regulation 299 then requires the SWMS before the work starts. Meanwhile regulation 300 tells the crew to stop if the work drifts away from it.
Notification sits alongside the SWMS rather than inside it. Under regulation 142 you must give the regulator five days written notice. The trigger is a structure, or a load-bearing part of one, at least six metres high. The same duty applies when load shifting machinery will operate on a suspended floor, and when the job uses explosives. Measure the height from the lowest ground level beside the base to the highest point.
Licensing then varies by jurisdiction. Therefore confirm the requirement with the WHS or building regulator before you price the job. Beyond that, regulations 34 to 38 still apply. You identify the hazards and work the hierarchy of control. Then you maintain what you put in place and review it as conditions change. A demolition SWMS that nobody revises as the building comes down has stopped being a control.
The engineer’s plan comes first and the demolition SWMS follows it
A structure behaves very differently during demolition than it did in service. Designers size members for the completed building with every brace, tie and slab in place. Remove one of those elements early and the load path changes, sometimes violently. Regulation 289 puts demolition inside the definition of construction work. So where the designer has issued the written safety report that regulation 295 requires, obtain it. Read it before you plan a single step.
Sometimes as-built documentation is missing. Sometimes fire, water or age has weakened the structure, or plant will track across a suspended floor. In each case a competent person such as a structural engineer should investigate and report. That report then drives the demolition plan. It sets the sequence of removal and the temporary bracing, propping and shoring. It also caps the wind speed for a partially demolished structure and fixes loading limits at every stage.
The SWMS does a different job. It does not restate the engineer’s sequence. Instead it controls how the crew follows that sequence. Who confirms the propping before the next element comes out. What stops the work when the wind picks up. How the supervisor verifies each stage against the plan, and who holds the authority to halt the job. Auditors read the two documents together. So when the SWMS quietly contradicts the plan, that contradiction becomes the finding.
The hazardous materials survey the demolition SWMS depends on
Nobody controls what nobody has identified. Under regulation 451 the demolition PCBU must have a competent person determine whether asbestos or asbestos containing material is present. Perhaps that person cannot be certain. Perhaps part of the structure sits inaccessible and the work will likely disturb it. Either way, the law tells you to assume asbestos is there and work accordingly.
The register carries the evidence. Regulation 448 tells you to review the asbestos register before demolition starts, and to revise it where it falls short. Under regulation 449, the person with management or control must hand that register over. Regulation 450 then puts the matching duty to obtain it on the demolition contractor. Where no register exists, the work waits until a competent person has inspected the structure. Regulation 452 then tells you to remove all asbestos likely to be disturbed, so far as is reasonably practicable, before demolition begins.
Removal itself demands a licence. A Class A licence covers friable asbestos, asbestos contaminated dust and any quantity of non-friable material. A Class B licence covers non-friable material only. Below ten square metres of non-friable asbestos you need no licence, although you certainly still need the controls. Regulation 458 then makes the PCBU who commissions the removal check that the removalist holds the right licence.
Asbestos never travels alone. Lead paint, polychlorinated biphenyls, synthetic mineral fibre, refrigerant gas, contaminated ground and silica dust all ride in demolition waste. Regulation 49 caps exposure at the workplace exposure standard. Therefore the survey should name each material, its location and its control before the machine arrives. Record those controls in the SWMS against the step that disturbs the material, not in a generic block at the back.
Services, exclusion zones and the drop zone
Isolation belongs at the front of the sequence. The crew shuts off or caps electricity, gas, water, sewer, telecommunications, fuel and refrigerant lines outside the building line. Notify the utility in advance. Where a service stays live for the demolition itself, protect it and say so in the SWMS.
Underground services follow the same logic. Regulation 304 requires all reasonable steps to obtain current underground essential services information before the work starts. Regulation 305 then requires you to manage the risks that information reveals. Start with the free national enquiry service on 1100. Then verify on the ground by potholing with insulated hand tools or vacuum excavation. Plans go stale, and an excavator bucket makes a poor locator.
Above ground, the exclusion zone does the heavy lifting. Any area where a falling object could land becomes a controlled zone. Barricade it, sign it and supervise it so nobody wanders in. Fence the debris drop zones, enclose the chutes, and extend the zone well beyond the footprint of the work. Where the public passes close by, hoarding, containment screens and overhead protection carry the load. AS 2601:2025 The demolition of structures sets out the detail. Meanwhile the Demolition Work Code of Practice explains the duty behind it.
Deconstruction, dust and the neighbours
Method selection is a hierarchy decision rather than a commercial one. Soft strip and deconstruction remove hazardous materials and fittings by hand before any machine touches the frame. That cuts dust, protects salvage value and keeps workers out of the collapse zone. Mechanical demolition then handles the structure itself from a safe standoff. Where a method exposes workers to a risk you could reasonably eliminate, the hierarchy says change the method.
Dust travels beyond the fence. Water suppression is the usual control. However it adds weight to debris and to suspended floors, so the engineer’s loading limits still apply. Silica, lead and asbestos fibres warrant containment rather than dilution. Noise and vibration deserve the same attention wherever hospitals, laboratories or shock-sensitive equipment sit nearby.
Adjoining buildings need explicit treatment as well. Where the demolition removes lateral support, you must replace it with temporary support that equals or exceeds it. Someone then checks that support as the work proceeds. Add the emergency plan that regulation 43 requires, tuned to partial collapse, entrapment and a services strike. At that point the document reads like a control rather than a permit to knock things over.
Practical Application
Picture a two-storey commercial building from the 1970s coming down to make way for a warehouse. The structure stands about eight metres to the parapet and sits hard against a neighbouring tenancy. Meanwhile the first draft of the demolition SWMS runs four pages. It covers the exclusion zone, an excavator with a pulveriser, a water cart and PPE.
The supervisor, J. Smith, works the gates instead. Height triggers regulation 142, so the notification goes to the regulator six days out rather than five. Classification catches paragraphs (c) and (d) of regulation 291. Therefore the document must cover both the load-bearing elements and the asbestos disturbance.
Next comes the survey. A competent person, A. Jones, finds bonded asbestos cement sheeting on the plant room walls. The same survey also picks up vinyl floor tiles with asbestos backing and lead paint on the steel stair. The existing register misses two of the three, so the team revises it. A licensed removalist then strips the sheeting and the tiles before any machine starts, and the clearance certificate goes on file.
Then the engineer sets the sequence. The party wall provides lateral support to the neighbour. Because of that, the plan calls for temporary props installed and inspected before the first-floor slab comes out. It also caps work above the wind speed the engineer nominates. C. Brown holds the spotter role at the drop zone with no other duties. Meanwhile the water cart runs continuously at the pulveriser. The SWMS also names the exact point at which work stops for a prop inspection. The job finishes without a stop-work notice, and the file explains precisely why.
Conclusion
A demolition SWMS earns its keep long before the machine arrives. Structural stability and hazardous material decide the outcome, while the knock itself is the easy part. Get the order right and the rest of the document almost writes itself.
MiSAFE SWMS builds that order into the document. It prompts authors to classify the work and confirm the survey and the engineer’s plan before the task rows appear. Furthermore it keeps the exclusion zone, the spotter and the material controls attached to the steps that create the risk.
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Download the Free Template
Download the free Demolition SWMS Pre-Start Control Checklist (.xlsx). It gates every demolition job through classification and notification, structural assessment, the hazardous materials survey, services and exclusion zones, and dust and public protection, with a documentation gate that stays closed until the survey and the engineer’s plan are on file.
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