Forestry's safety record no longer going to pot

The industry is taking a hardline stance on drugs and alcohol. Photo Bastiaan Beentjes

"We may come out and start supporting those people calling for a lowering of the alcohol limit," muses David Rhodes.

Rhodes, the Forest Owners' Association chief whose members are cracking down on foresters' love of a pint, a smoke and, sometimes, something more illicit, can see both the benefits and pitfalls of such a hard-line stance.

It is driving people out of an industry that is desperately short of skilled staff, he concedes.

But it is saving lives, reducing injuries and boosting the bottom line by drastically reducing time off work.

"Even though it's going to cost them in terms of getting staff, they've just decided that we as an industry have to be totally committed to eliminating drug and alcohol injury," he says of the random testing regime.

Accident Compensation claims data released in July shows forestry recorded the lowest annual figure for claims.

In the year to June, 318 entitlement claims - serious injury requiring time off work - were recorded. That's a 36 per cent reduction on the 499 claims in the 2003-2004 year.

When the boom started in late 2008, annual ACC claims were 367 but injuries have declined every year since.

Over the same period, contractors felled logs at a rate equivalent to 42 per cent above the five-year average.

Contractor's representative John Stulen says it's a sensational result as companies aren't yet putting on extra labour, hours are up and workload, in terms of logs, has nearly doubled.

The harm reduction, he says, is better than the farming and construction sectors achieved over a comparable period.

A positive test for alcohol or drugs, most commonly cannabis, is not an infraction requiring instant dismissal, assures Rhodes.

"It's backed up by systems where you help people get through stuff," he says. "But we're trying to eliminate incidents in the workplace because it's not just the people actually doing the drugs and alcohol, it's the people around them and we're dealing with machinery."

Stulen describes cannabis use as endemic and "we're driving it out of the workplace". All of the big players have signed up to drug testing, he says, and have spent considerable money developing programmes, providing educational material and bringing in motivational speakers to rid the industry of the drug.

"We've got a society that has gone too liberal," Stulen asserts, "and we've got to work out who's good and who has got a problem."

Asked about situations where workers are using on a Friday and get picked up for it on a Monday, Rhodes is unsympathetic: "That's just one of the things you're going to have to think about in this industry."