Fenton Darien: Health and Safety Reform Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFenton Darien: Health and Safety Reform Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 13 March 2014. Volume:697;Page:16707. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]DARIEN FENTON (Labour):Labour is supporting the Health and Safety Reform Bill. It is a very important bill and much needed given New Zealand’s poor health and safety record and the unnecessary deaths and injuries workers are suffering on the job. The impetus for this change started with the awful tragedy at Pike River mine 3 years ago. The story of that disaster is far from over as we saw on TV3 earlier this week. No one has yet been held to account for the loss of the lives of 29 men whose families have had their lives changed forever. Pike River exposed the realities and consequences of the deregulation of workers’ rights including health and safety during the 1990s.The Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992 has been described as an object lesson in how not to implement legislation. Typical of the National Government of the time it was light-handed regulation and left it up to employers to get things right. Unions were excluded and tripartism ignored. This coincided with a time when National’s attacks on workers’ rights left unions greatly weakened and workers exposed and unprotected. The Department of Labour’s health and safety inspectorate was run down and to this day it struggles to keep up with the demand and problems.New Zealand has a terrible health and safety record. Around 75 people die from workplace accidents every year in this country. There are 200000 work-related claims made every year to ACC from people being harmed at work. In addition there are 500 to 800 deaths from occupational diseases such as cancers including from asbestos. We have seen pretty scary stuff around KiwiRail in the last week. In the last year safety in the forestry industry has been highlighted as another disaster. Ten men lost their lives last year. There has been one already this year. The Minister of Labour has consistently refused to launch an inquiry. To the credit of the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions and to the credit of its president Helen Kelly the issue is now being taken seriously by the industry itself which has set up its own independent inquiry.That does not mean the issue will go to sleep. In a few weeks’ time on 28 April Workers’ Memorial Day families of forestry workers killed at work will come together to remind us all that urgent action is needed in this industry. I want to pay tribute to them and also to the work of the seven lonely health and safety inspectors in the forestry industry who must be run off their feet after the Minister finally gave up on his voluntary code of practice and got real inspections happening in our forestries. There were some shocking outcomes. Nearly half of the 162 forest operations visited were not operating in compliance with the industry code. Inspectors had to take 203 enforcement actions to force these operations to comply—15 of them had to be shut down completely because they were so dangerous. So although the attention has been on mines and forestry there are other dangerous industries in New Zealand as well that will need attention: construction road transport and farming to name a few.Labour is committed to working with the Government on this bill through the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee to make it as good as it can be. It must mark a turning point in New Zealand’s health and safety for the sake of those families who have lost loved ones in dreadful accidents and for the thousands of workers injured maimed or exposed to disease in our workplaces.The bill covers new ground in many ways. Firstly there is a definition of “worker” in clause 14 that covers all workers. It recognises the variety of working arrangements we have now—triangular relationships contractors self-employment—and applies the same rights to all workers regardless of their employment status. Then there is the concept of a person conducting a business or undertaking or PCBU ensuring the health and safety of workers or others affected by the work. There is shared responsibility for multiple persons in control of businesses or undertakings and through supply chains and that is designed to incentivise coordinated action rather than passing the buck. In my opinion there needs to be a lot more work done on supply chains and their impact not only on health and safety but on workers’ rights and wages generally. I am thinking of road transport as a good example. We will have the chance to talk about this in the select committee.However we can see some fish hooks in the details that we will want to discuss. For example the introduction of work groups under clause 66 could lead to workers who want to elect a health and safety representative for the first time finding themselves in a cumbersome negotiation with the person conducting a business or undertaking to work out how to divide the workplace into work groups. This could easily take months and sap the will of the workers to create a safe system. Under the current New Zealand system senior or expert health and safety representatives can collaborate with more junior ones. The proposed system would allow health and safety representatives to act only on behalf of their own work groups except in exceptional circumstances. These changes are worse than our current system and will not lead to better health and safety. Another disappointment is that despite all the recommendations of the royal commission and the Independent Taskforce on Workplace Health and Safety and the requirements of ILO Convention 155 there is very little tripartism built into this system under this bill or WorkSafe New Zealand itself.Labour has called on the Minister time and again to recognise the importance of the role of unions of business and of the Government coming together to improve health and safety in this country but it seems to be being ignored. And then there is the training of health and safety representatives. The bill recognises and implements a worker participation system but is silent on their rights to training. Under the current Health and Safety in Employment Act health and safety representatives have a right to 2 days’ training a year. The bill removes the right to any specific amount of training in clause 80 and leaves this question to the regulations. We do not think that is good enough particularly when health and safety training has been ditched by the Minister for ACC Judith Collins who said—in a very insulting way I thought—that training workers in health and safety was a waste of time a waste of money and a rort. There seems to be some conflict between Judith Collins and Simon Bridges about the important role of worker participation and the need to be trained. So I want to know how the obligations for worker participation can be met under this bill. Yes it sets up a new system but without training and without that obligation to allow training and to pay for it there is a problem.We support the right to take private prosecutions where the State fails to step in but the proposal to retain the current system is too weak and needs to be fixed. There is no provision in the bill on corporate manslaughter which we have repeatedly called for. Therefore this remains a gap in the law. The most egregious cases of workplace death caused by gross negligence will still be met with a fine and where the failure is a systemic one directors and senior management will not be held to account. Employees have weaker remedies than other workers under this bill for the same adverse conduct because they are forced to use the personal grievance framework under the Employment Relations Act 2000 and therefore for example are subject to a reduction in penalties for contributory behaviour and limitations on penalties.They are some of the concerns we have. But then of course there are all the other things that the Government has done that have undermined effective health and safety such as the proposed removal of rest and meal breaks the 90-day trial period which allows employers to dismiss workers for raising health and safety concerns the weakening of union access rights so workers are left unprotected and of course the crazy Employment Relations Amendment Bill which the Minister of Labour seems to have given up on.This may indeed be the greatest reform to health and safety in 20 years and it is needed but what is also needed is recognition by this Government that our current employment laws and its proposed changes to those will work against the good intentions of this bill. I am calling on the Minister with the good work on this Health and Safety Reform Bill to withdraw his Employment Relations Amendment Bill to show that he finally understands that workers’ rights go hand in hand with health and safety.