Little Andrew: Health and Safety (Pike River Implementation) Bill — In CommitteeText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLittle Andrew: Health and Safety (Pike River Implementation) Bill — In Committee[Sitting date: 12 November 2013. Volume:694;Page:14597. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]ANDREW LITTLE (Labour): This part of the Health and Safety (Pike River Implementation) Bill really goes to the guts of what lay at the bottom and was the rotten part of Pike River. It was one of the essential parts of what the Royal Commission on the Pike River Coal Mine Tragedy addressed and also the independent task force’s report on health and safety—that is the engagement and the involvement of workers indecisions about health and safety. It is certainly a welcome development to see that this is now made explicit in a way that was never in the Health and Safety in Employment Act. In spite of the last Labour Government’s best attempts to make it more explicit and to encourage greater involvement of workers in health and safety by setting up health and safety committees and by funding health and safety training for health and safety representatives clearly that still was not adequate to avoid the disaster that happened at Pike River and indeed the disasters that have happened at many workplaces around New Zealand over the last 20 years where workers have continued to be injured and maimed and in the worst cases killed. It is good to see now that there is a more comprehensive adumbration of what is expected when it comes to worker participation in health and safety.But it would be remiss of me not to say or to acknowledge that notwithstanding a clearer signal being given a more explicit signal being given about what is expected there is nevertheless because of the language used I think some equivocation in just what we can expect to see employers doing—and workers therefore doing—when it comes to health and safety. Although there is now specific provision for site health and safety representatives a site health and safety committee and the involvement of workers in health and safety it is couched in terms of workers contributing to decisions. In point of fact I do not even think that is the language. It is about ensuring that when decisions are made the perspective of employees or workers is heard. It does not go as far in my view as it should which is that workers are seen as having an equal role to play in the decision making about health and safety.Naturally there will be resource implications for employers when they are engaging with their workforces about health and safety because workers will have a view about for example the PPE or the personal protective equipment that is required in particular tasks. They might have a view about what is required and employers will have a different view. To give a classic example in the State sector prison officers routinely have a view about the personal protective equipment they require to do their job effectively and safely and their employer—the Department of Corrections and therefore the Government—often has a different view and it is usually a view that entails less personal protective equipment.In a truly worker participative mode in a truly engaged model of worker participation that would be a shared decision. There would be an argument but that would be a shared decision and the employer would understand and acknowledge exactly what the risks are. They would have an obligation under this bill and indeed under the current Health and Safety in Employment Act to mitigate those risks. A decision would be taken and it would be a shared decision. That is what a truly tripartite regime looks like at the enterprise level or the organisation level if it is a nationwide organisation.I draw the Committee’s attention to that because to the extent that this bill starts taking steps in the right direction as we acknowledged before in Part 1 and with the failure to set up a truly tripartite governance structure with the WorkSafe New Zealand board in this part we just do not get far enough when it comes to the measures required for genuine employee or worker participation and engagement in health and safety measures. That is the test by which this bill will be measured. That is the test that was set up by both the royal commission and the independent task force. What are we doing to ensure proper engagement so that when the decisions are made about health and safety the workforce and its insights and knowledge from the front line are truly captured? That is I think what we are looking for to make sure happens in this part.