Fenton Darien: WorkSafe New Zealand Bill Health and Safety in Employment Amendment Bill Mines Rescue Bill — Third ReadingsText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFenton Darien: WorkSafe New Zealand Bill Health and Safety in Employment Amendment Bill Mines Rescue Bill — Third Readings[Sitting date: 14 November 2013. Volume:694;Page:14742. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DARIEN FENTON (Labour): I want to start by acknowledging the members of Parliament who have been directly involved in this tragedy: Kevin Hague Chris Auchinvole Damien O’Connor and of course Andrew Little who was the secretary of the Amalgamated Engineering Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) at the time and I think something like 17 of the 29 men were members of his union. Next week next Tuesday is the third anniversary of this dreadful event that dreadful day that I do not think those of us will ever forget. It was a dreadful day when we realised that the 29 men were all dead that they had all died that there was no hope and that they had lost their lives in a mine in the South Island.How far we have come in 3 years—how far we have come. I have vivid memories of the memorial service that many of us went down to. There were 10000-odd people who turned up to the memorial service at the racecourse in Greymouth. I remember very well Peter Whittall speaking at that memorial service. The fellow workers of the dead miners and the EPMU were down among the crowd unacknowledged. The union was unacknowledged as if it played no part and as if it had no role to play in that workplace. I also remember very clearly that Peter Whittall was nominated as New Zealander of the Year. He was treated like a hero—he was treated like a hero.When you think about Joseph Dunbar that 17-year-old boy on his first day at work at the Pike River mine who actually asked to go to work on Friday instead of on Monday because he was so excited about his job and when you think about the responsibilities of people like Peter Whittall it just shows you how much we have through the process of the Royal Commission on the Pike River Coal Mine Tragedy owned up to some of the things that went wrong and accepted that there is a legacy of terrible terrible errors. It shows you how far we have come when we have this legislation—the WorkSafe New Zealand Bill the Health and Safety in Employment Amendment Bill and the Mines Rescue BillI think an important thing to note in this legislation are the observations of not only the royal commission but also of the Independent Taskforce on Workplace Health andSafety that the failure that culminated at the Pike River mine which occurs in our workplaces almost every week when a worker dies has been driven by labour market and health and safety deregulation going back 20 years or more. Although we all like to say New Zealanders should have the right to go to work and come home safely we have ignored the role of regulation in making sure that happens. In the Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992 and the collapse of the responsibility of the Department of Labour and the regulator we have been responsible for negligence.Although I celebrate this legislation—with reservations of course—I still do not believe as I have said many times that the Minister of Labour understands the connection between regulation workers’ rights and the way they are treated at work and health and safety on the job. There is a huge disconnect between the regulation we are making in this legislation and the changes to the Employment Relations Act he is pushing through. I suspect that in time—well maybe we will not have to because Labour will repeal those changes but I hope in time we will not be standing here saying that that deregulation contributed to more tragedy like this.I also know that the pain of the families is far from over. I mean how does a family ever get over losing a loved one—a 17-year-old son a husband a partner? I do not know how that happens. I hope that this legislation will be seen by them as a legacy—a positive legacy a meaningful legacy—that offers some comfort to them.There continue to be many unresolved injustices. Kevin Hague talked about the lack of accountability and the fact that no one—no Government agency individual or corporation—has been held to account for the deaths of 29 men. It is very disappointing coming up to the third anniversary to have a Government that is denying accountability as well as evidenced by its refusal to entertain the idea of paying compensation in place of the company which has refused or been unable to pay these families out.I think we need to remember that this tragedy started and ended with systemic failures by the regulator and by multiple Government departments. The licence should never have been let to open the mine in the first place. We then had the failure of the Department of Labour and the running-down of the mines inspectorate so that there were only two inspectors for the whole mines inspectorate. We had the terrible stories about how they had to scratch around for resources and even had to beg for travel so they could go and inspect mines. That is systemic failure negligence and not taking responsibility. For the Government to take no responsibility for the regulator for its own Government departments by offering these families some compensation I find really abhorrent. Let us not forget that two of the shareholders in the Pike River coal mine were also Crown agencies. I am talking about ACC and the New Zealand Superannuation Fund. We all know that ACC has a huge bulging surplus at the moment. Why can the Prime Minister not pick up the phone and say “How about it? How about we help these families put to bed their pain?”It is true that some of them will have had some small amounts of compensation. Many of them did not receive ACC because the men who died did not have dependants. There were not of course any funerals so there was no ACC assistance with that. They have had to fork out for travel and for representation. It was not until some weeks—2 or 3 weeks—after the travel that the families were calling out for someone to help them. I know that not only has it cost them in bearing the loss that they bear but also it has cost them financially.As I said I hope the passing of this legislation will offer some comfort to the families. My colleagues Andrew Little and Kevin Hague have referred to the concerns we still have about this legislation and the things that have been missed or that could have been strengthened. I also hope that when we see the next health and safety bill theMinister listens and picks up those issues because we all have a responsibility to make sure that we never see a tragedy like this again in New Zealand. The Government has a responsibility to help those families through this and also to make sure that the new WorkSafe agency is properly resourced. I understand there are now four mines inspectors. I want to know whether that is adequate. The Government has a responsibility to make this work. It is fine to pass legislation but you have got to put the money in and you have got to make sure it happens. Labour is very pleased to support this legislation with as I said some reservations. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to it.