The line is drawn by the kind of asbestos and the amount, not by the cost of the job. Anything over 10 m² of non-friable asbestos, and friable asbestos in any quantity, has to be removed by a licensed asbestos removalist. Even within the homeowner’s allowance, WorkSafe strongly recommends a licensed removalist for any asbestos removal.
General informationGeneral information from WorkSafe WA, HealthyWA and WA’s regulations, not advice about any job. WorkSafe adds that some removals need approval first, and names the council or shire’s environmental health and compliance team as the place to ask.
Asbestos safety
The national Asbestos and Silica Safety and Eradication Agency says it is “not recommended that you handle or remove asbestos yourself”, and that a professional makes the job easier, safer and often cheaper. Its rule for the waste: it goes only to a landfill site licensed to take it, and a household rubbish bin can bring a fine.
No safe level of exposure to asbestos exists, WorkSafe WA says. It reserves friable asbestos in any amount, and non-friable asbestos over 10 m², for a licensed asbestos removalist only, and tells homeowners in WA that the waste has to be handled safely, moved properly and delivered to a licensed asbestos disposal facility.
WA’s health advice and the national agency warn against some methods. HealthyWA says high-pressure water and air cannot be used on asbestos products. The national agency warns against cleaning an asbestos cement roof, or any asbestos material, with high-pressure water or anything abrasive, scrubbing and sanding included. For its own state’s homeowners, Queensland’s government asbestos site lists “Saw, sand, scrape or drill holes in asbestos materials” among things not to do.
Two kinds of asbestos
Non-friable, or bonded
Asbestos held in a material such as cement or rubber, which stabilises it. WorkSafe’s plain description is solid and not easily crumbled.
Friable
Asbestos-containing material that is a powder, or can easily be crumbled or reduced to powder by hand when dry. WorkSafe also describes it as crumbly or easily broken.
Condition matters as well as kind. WA Health’s guidance on pressure-cleaned roofs calls for an unrestricted removalist because of the friable nature of the damaged material. Where it is unclear what condition the asbestos is in, WorkSafe’s advice is to ask a competent person before any work starts.
Who may remove what
| The asbestos | Who may remove it | What else the sources say |
|---|---|---|
| Non-friable, up to 10 m² | The homeowner, from their own home. WorkSafe’s Removing asbestos page also lets a tradesperson remove less than 10 m² on the homeowner’s behalf. | WorkSafe strongly recommends a licensed removalist all the same, and says there is no safe level of exposure. |
| Non-friable, more than 10 m² | A licensed asbestos removalist. A Class B licence covers it, and so does Class A. | For Class B work, a nominated supervisor has to be readily available. |
| Friable, any amount | A Class A licensed removalist only. | A nominated supervisor has to be on site whenever the work is going on, and a licensed asbestos assessor must be used. |
| Badly damaged or crumbly material | HealthyWA strongly recommends a Class A licensed contractor, at any quantity. | The paper backing of old linoleum and textured ceiling coatings are its examples of more loosely bound fibre. |
One wording difference between WorkSafe’s own pages: its Asbestos and the law page gives the homeowner up to 10 m², and its Removing asbestos page says less than 10 m². Both put anything larger with a licensed removalist.
How quickly 10 m² goes
An example, with made-up measurementsSuppose a house has eaves lining 0.6 m deep along 18 m of its front and back walls, and the lining is non-friable asbestos cement. Its area is 0.6 × 18 = 10.8 m², so taking it all down is already past the homeowner’s 10 m². Half of it, 0.6 × 9 = 5.4 m², is inside the line. The example shows only the arithmetic; whether any lining contains asbestos is for testing to say.
Ten square metres is about the area of the hatched patch in the drawing above: roughly 4.2 m by 2.4 m of wall.
Three licences
WorkSafe issues three types of asbestos licence. A Class A removalist can remove every type of asbestos, friable and non-friable; a Class B removalist can remove only non-friable asbestos. In WA, Class A is also called “unrestricted” and Class B “restricted”. The third licence is the licensed asbestos assessor, who can carry out air monitoring and clearance inspections and issue clearance certificates for all removal work.
The same rules follow anyone paid to do the work. WorkSafe says anyone paid to work on a property is bound by the asbestos removal rules; trades and construction workers hired for the work fall under the work health and safety laws, and those laws cap what a tradesperson may remove without one. Its Online Licence Search shows whether a contractor holds the right licence.
What a licensed job involves
A removal control plan
Under WA’s Work Health and Safety (General) Regulations 2022, as at 1 July 2026, a licensed removalist must prepare an asbestos removal control plan for any licensed removal work it is engaged to do.
Five days’ notice to WorkSafe
The removalist must give WorkSafe written notice at least 5 days before licensed removal work begins. Where the asbestos has to come out immediately, the notice is given at once by telephone and in writing within 24 hours.
Word to the household and the neighbours
At a residential property, WorkSafe says, the licensed removalist must tell the occupier, the owner and anyone living in premises in the immediate vicinity before the work is done. The law does not say how.
A supervisor
Every removal licence holder works under nominated supervisors: on site at all times for Class A work, readily available for Class B.
Clearance
Friable work done by a Class A removalist must use a licensed assessor, the licence that can issue clearance certificates. For other licensed work, WorkSafe’s code of practice says nobody may use the area again until a clearance certificate has been issued, and the independent competent person who issues it must first be satisfied that the area, and the area around it, are free of visible asbestos contamination.
Within the allowance
For an owner who does decide to remove a small amount themselves, the national agency’s steps include telling the neighbours about the work and asking them to keep their doors and windows shut while it goes on. HealthyWA’s Asbestos removal page sets out its full method for a homeowner, from protective gear to clean-up. It is not retold here: read whole, it is the official account. How the waste then leaves the property is in wrapping and carrying asbestos waste.