New safety law put to the test

By PAULA OLIVER

The next six months will be crucial to the success of groundbreaking new health and safety laws that come into effect today, Business New Zealand says.

Executive director Anne Knowles told the Business Herald that employers would be watching closely to see how Occupational Safety and Health Service (OSH) inspectors and newly trained staff representatives took up their duties under the tougher regime.

The new laws promote employee participation in health and safety issues.

Employers are explicitly made liable for hazardous stress and fatigue their staff experience at work, and maximum fines for breaches of the act are increased fivefold.

The amendments to the Health and Safety in Employment Act were hotly debated before being passed into law late last year.

Organisations representing business spent a year opposing them and at least one labelled the changes "anti-growth".

But Minister of Labour Margaret Wilson is confident the legislation will help turn around what she calls New Zealand's unacceptable toll of illness, injury and death in workplaces.

Latest statistics show that there were 229,489 work-related injuries in the year to June 2002 - a slight increase on the previous year.

Ten per cent of those injuries were serious enough for the employee to take five or more days off work.

More than half of the accidents happened in industrial or construction areas, and more injuries were the result of falling, tripping or slipping than any other cause.

Last year OSH investigated 73 workplace fatalities. Workers were strangled, burned, decapitated, electrocuted, drowned and crushed.

Wilson has labelled the country's record "appalling".

She wants the new laws to create a culture of zero tolerance for behaviour that causes accidents and ill-health in the workplace.

But Business New Zealand says that workplace perceptions of the new legislation will heavily depend upon how it is enacted over the next six months.

Knowles warned that a rash of employee claims of stress or a flurry of on-the-spot fines would be detrimental in the long-term.

Fatigue and stress have always been covered by the act, but the new amendments make it explicit. Now, just as employers have to ensure scaffolding or Machinery is safe, they have to ensure employees are not harmed by hazardous stress and fatigue.

Knowles says that this responsibility must be shared.

"There must be a responsibility on employees to alert their employer to the fact that they are suffering work-related stress out of the normal - something that is really starting to impinge on your health and safety at work."

Knowles said that with open communication the issue could be managed like any other in the normal course of a day's work.

The new changes also mean that employers must allow their employees greater involvement in health and safety issues.

If an employer employs more than 30 staff, he or she must co-operate with employees and their union to develop, agree, implement and maintain what is called an "employee participation system".

The system includes the appointment of a health and safety representative.

Many large and medium-sized businesses already have effective plans which will not need to change.

But smaller employers are likely to feel a greater level of change. The new legislation requires an employer of fewer than 30 people to also come up with an "employee participation system" if an employee or their union asks for it. They must also appoint a health and safety representative if requested, and that person must be entitled to two days' paid leave each year to attend approved training courses.

Knowles said it was important that the trained health and safety representatives took on a shared responsibility and not the sole responsibility.

"It shouldn't be viewed that once you've got a trained health and safety representative that employees don't have to do anything themselves. The employer obviously still has the responsibility and the liability, but it's a shared responsibility that everybody has to buy into."

Employers were concerned that OSH inspectors would dish out on-the-spot fines and not maintain their educative role, she said.

There was also concern about how new health and safety representatives would act.

If the focus was on reinforcing the point that accidents were everybody's concern, Knowles said she thought the new legislation would be successful. But if the focus was on fines or on taking proceedings against an employer, it wouldn't.

"A lot will depend on how the OSH inspectors and the trained health and safety representatives actually take up their responsibilities. Employers will be watching very closely. Very, very, closely."

OSH general manager Bob Hill said that the department was well aware that employers and workers had high expectations that implementation of the changes would be well managed.

He said OSH had worked with unions and employer organisations on that subject for the past two years, and he hoped they continued to give advice as the act bedded in.

Asked if OSH inspectors would lose their educative role, Hill said: "An HSE inspector's role has always been to inform employers and workers. They have done this well and will continue to do this."

A warning must be given before a fine can be imposed.

Council of Trade Unions president Ross Wilson said employers should end their rhetoric about fines and compliance costs and make the act work.

"It won't happen unless there is a joint commitment to it. It needs a serious commitment to make a difference to our appalling safety record. It won't happen overnight."

Knowles said that Business New Zealand was firmly of the view that one workplace death was one too many. She said that all groups were coming from the same direction on that issue.

The Minister of Labour is certain that the act gives rise to opportunities that will improve the country's workplace accident statistics.

To boost its effect, the Government is to make a pre-Budget announcement today to allocate $162,000 to setting up a five-member advisory committee on health and safety. The move arose from concerns that research on the topic was fragmented among universities and departments.

pf* In Forum tomorrow, employer and union views on what the new health and safety law will mean.

The key changes

Changes to the Health and Safety in Employment Act come into effect today. Employers made explicitly liable for hazardous stress and fatigue their staff experience at work.

Worker participation in health and safety issues is promoted.

If an employee or their union requests it, or an employer employs 30 or more people, an employer must co-operate with employees and their union to develop an employee participation system.

A health and safety representative must be appointed if requested.

Insuring against fines arising from health and safety convictions becomes illegal.

Penalties are increased for the most serious offences. The maximum fine goes up to $500,000, while the maximum jail term rises to two years.

Coverage is extended to the maritime, aviation and rail sectors.

Cars explicitly become workplaces.