Moroney Sue: Health and Safety Reform Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeMoroney Sue: Health and Safety Reform Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee[Sitting date: 19 August 2015. Volume:707;Page:6005. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]SUE MORONEY (Labour): I just want to say at the outset that all this talk of persons conducting a business or undertaking (PCBUs) being reasonably practicable and all these sorts of things are important. I know that for the public who are listening it might sound awfully technical but this is about getting the legalities right about health and safety in the workplace and doing that in Part 2 is incredibly important. I want to cut to the chase in Part 2 and ask some serious questions of the Minister for Workplace Relations and Safety because I think it comes down to the practicalities. I want the Minister to reflect on clause 30 which is the primary duty of care that the PCBUs must undertake.I want to put some scenarios to him because these are the scenarios that really make a difference in the workplace. The first one is to do with clause 30(3)(c) which says that “a PCBU must ensure so far as is reasonably practicable … (c) the provision and maintenance of safe systems of work;”. The situation I want to put to him is this: many of us believe that in the forestry industry one of the main drivers of bad health and safety practices is a system of work where the remuneration is set up so that employees get paid by the number of logs they fell rather than by the hour. It is the view of some of us—certainly it is my view—that this drives very bad health and safety practices because it means that it puts pressure on the workers to work at a faster rate than may be safe because that is the only way that they can make a decent living.Certainly I believe that that was part of the story that Debbie McMillan who is in the gallery here tonight told me about the death of her husband Shane Frater when he died in a forestry accident and that the—I think they call it “piece rate”—piece rate way of operating in the forestry industry was a main driver of bad health and safety practices. So the question I am posing to the Minister is whether a PCBU who operates that sort of system at work is compliant with that part of the bill that I just read out—clause 30(3)(c)? I would hope that the answer is no.This is going to be a little contentious but this is the serious nature of workplace health and safety. I would also ask the Minister whether an employer who uses another piece of legislation that has been passed quite recently by his Government and who has actually negotiated with workers that they do not take their tea break but get some payment for it instead—like the chocolate fish or the extra muffin or whatever recompense they have negotiated—is complying with this part of the bill. Can the PCBU negotiate their way out of providing a tea break or a lunch break for workers which in my view is actually a fundamental piece of goodworkplacehealth and safety and be compliant with this part of the legislation?I am really concerned to see that the Government whips are putting closure motions while we have still got these very serious and reasonable questions on the table for the Minister to answer.The CHAIRPERSON (Hon Trevor Mallard): Order! Closure motions have been dealt with by the Chair and I do not want to have debate on them even before they happen. It might indicate that members are running out things to say about the bill.SUE MORONEY: It is no such indication. It is an indication that I want it taken very seriously by this Committee that there are reasonable questions on the table for the Minister to answer which he has not had an opportunity to answer yet and which I hope in all seriousness are answered by this Minister because this is now cutting to the chase of whether this clause is going to be practicable in terms of dealing with health and safety issues.Earlier—I think the Minister might not have been in the chair at the time—I asked some serious questions about a number of other industries and whether it would apply as well in other workplace practices. For example in the Pike River mine we saw—and I know this happens in lots of other workplaces—bonuses being offered to workers in order for them to undertake unsafe practices to complete projects in an unsafe way at speed and to be offered bonuses. In the instance of Pike River mine what we know is that workers were offered bonuses of $10000 if they completed a project in a certain period of time and for every week that went by that the project was not completed they lost $2500 of their bonus. Those sorts of practices—