A team of RMIT researchers tasked with reviewing progress five years after a report into a series of construction industry deaths in Canberra was told not to provide any recommendations on their findings.
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The territory brought on the team to review of progress on the 28 recommendations of the Getting Home Safely report that followed a series of deaths on local building sites over five years ago.
It comes as the government faces union calls to remove Worksafe ACT from the broader Access Canberra agency, amid continued Safe Work Australia reports highlighting Canberra's poor safety record on building sites.
But it is understood the government told the RMIT team not to make any actual recommendations for further action.
The review was originally meant to "identify what has been achieved, what is yet to be achieved, and what new targets or strategies should be put in place" on safety and culture on Canberra's building sites.
But a spokeswoman for Workplace Safety Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said the report did not "contain a section detailing conclusions", to allow the committee to "discuss and formulate its own position on the report's results".
It is understood the lack of formal findings in the report caused some consternation within the committee, given it was originally proposed by the Getting Home Safely panel that it would make recommendations for further action.
The committee ultimately asked the government to go back to RMIT to make formal findings and recommendations, but neither the first report, nor the updated version, have yet been publicly released.
Ms Stephen-Smith's spokeswoman said that committee members "discussed the absence of conclusions in the report", and its request to update it to include RMIT's conclusions "has been actioned".
While she has promised to the publicly release a report from RMIT on the issue "shortly", it is unclear whether that will be the original report, the updated version, or both, and she would not be drawn on a specific date.
The few details the government has released publicly about it were in a statement Ms Stephen-Smith recently made to the Legislative Assembly when she said it found a "disconnect" between worker and manager perspectives on safety in Canberra.
The government says it has implemented all of the Getting Home Safely report's recommendations, except for two made for the relevant industry bodies to develop a framework for managing safety on Canberra's building sites.
But both the CFMEU and Master Builders Association in the ACT have argued that recommendation should be for government to execute, and work on that has long since stalled.
Ms Stephen-Smith's spokeswoman said the the advisory committee however, had been tasked with "developing and recommending a new strategic plan to improve safety and health".
"This course of action builds on the implementation of the Getting Home Safely Report recommendations and ensures key construction industry stakeholders are working together and will take ownership of a new safety strategy for the industry," she said.
