In 1939 Dr Neil George gave us the statement: Safety is a state of mind by which men are constantly made aware of the possibility of injury at all times._x000D_
Is this statement still relevant? Have we been able to capture the essence of Dr George's statement in our current safety management systems and have we been able to capture the lessons from the past? Drawing upon 25 years of experience in the mining industry we explore what was done in the past, how this related to Dr George's statement and how the industry has progressed to the current safety management systems. We review the safety management system used by Roche Mining and demonstrate how it has improved safety outcomes for Roche._x000D_
We then look to the future - are there new challenges? Are the current management systems equipped to cater for these new challenges and deliver continued improvement in safety outcomes? There will always be a desire to improve the industry's safety outcomes and so how are future generations going to achieve the improvement in safety outcomes? FORMAL CITATION:McGowan, D, 2007. Is safety in the future simply a state of mind? in Proceedings New Leaders' 2007, pp 11-14 (The Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy: Melbourne).