O'Connor Damien: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
O'Connor Damien: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:674;Page:20446] 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR (Labour) 
: 
 The Department of Labour is responsible for workplace safety in New Zealand. I could have a speech of my own but all I need to do is read from the very sad and very long transcripts of the royal commission inquiry on Pike River in Greymouth. I will quote from them because some of the statements are quite profound and they affect the Department of Labour—what it should be doing what it could be doing and what it is not doing. 
The head of workplace health and safety policy management Mr James Murphy admitted in two statements that insufficient funding is going from this mean Government—the same Government that gave away $14 billion in tax cuts—to a department that is responsible for workplace health and safety not only in mining but across every industry. Mr Murphy admitted that inspectors were “coming up short for lack of resources and lack of training”. He also told the hearing that mines inspectors’ inspections would require resources to be taken from another area of the Department of Labour if they were going to up their ante. Well that is very sad as I said. On page 641 of the transcript one of the inspectors said that there is effectively a lack of audits of mines. At another place on page 641 he said there is no structured professional development in place. On page 645 he said there is no plan for the training of inspectors and no unannounced mine visits—presumably because of a lack of resources. 
There are 29 dead men still in a mine; there is no recovery operation because the Government refuses to provide funding for that recovery. There is a seal on the mine now. Families are waiting—waiting for action. When the Government came down it made a song and dance. It promised everything to everyone but it has now walked away from the Pike River mine. 
Chris Tremain 
: Oh that is rubbish. 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR 
: No that is not rubbish. There are no resources. There has been no commitment from the National Government—no commitment—to provide the funds to continue with the recovery of those bodies. I say that the front— 
Hon Christopher Finlayson 
: You’re a disgrace to the name O’Connor. 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR 
: Well that Minister says that; I would not like to get into some of the “h” words that I could apply to him. When he can front up with the right money not for his mates in tax cuts but for the Department of Labour to run a proper mines inspectorate then I will judge his true commitment to humanity. That is right I say to the Minister. I say “Put the money where your mouth is.” 
There have been comments from a person in New Zealand who provides advice to the Chinese mining industry and he is horrified that the Department of Labour this under-resourced department has been telling its dwindling bunch of mines inspectors—in fact there is only one now—that they should not give any advice to mining companies in case they incur legal liability for the department as a result. What sort of under-resourced stingy mines inspectorate does the Department of Labour support? Well I think that the next two phases of the royal commission hearings will expose that even further. 
I have to say that it is a sad state when in this First World country our mines inspectorate is inferior has no legal obligation and in fact has been advised by senior people in the department not to go out and help to raise the level of safety in mines. That person also said that nowhere else in the developed world would the mines inspectorate give such nonsensical advice. Although I do not expect the Minister in the chair the Acting Minister of Energy and Resources probably to answer these things it is imperative that she passes on to her Minister the fact that the mines inspectorate at the moment is totally and inadequately resourced and unskilled to carry out the role of the inspection of mines and the upholding of safety in underground mines in New Zealand as of this day. The Minister of Labour refuses to resource the mines inspectorate to increase the number of inspectors or to do anything about safety standards in underground coalmining. 
It is bordering on immoral that the Minister and the department will sit on their hands until the end of the royal commission hearings. I accepted the need for us to give the commission clear space and it has all the information before it now. But it would be immoral of me to sit on my hands having heard the information and the evidence at the first round of the royal commission and not to push the Government to increase upgrade and properly resource the mines inspectorate in this country. I ask the Minister in the chair because she is a very reasonable person whether she thinks—not needing any knowledge of mining—that the current Minister should refuse to do something that is so glaringly obvious. The senior policy person from the Department of Labour has admitted that the department— 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: Labour had 9 long years. 
Hon Christopher Finlayson 
: 9 years. 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR 
: —and the Ministers opposite know this—did take a more hands-off approach and that the department is now thinking that actually it was too hands-off. But in the same submission it admits that if any resources are to be put into the mines inspectorate to upgrade it then the resources will have to be taken from somewhere else in the Department of Labour. 
Well we are debating the estimates so I ask where the money is. Where are the resources both to uphold standards across other industries and to boost the mines inspectorate when there is a desperate need as of today? Tomorrow men will go underground and incidents are happening. A report a late report has been done on one of the major underground mines which shows that the department is full of holes and which clearly indicates that a lot of work still needs to be done and a lot of guidance needs to be given by experts in the mines inspectorate. 
Hon Christopher Finlayson 
: What was done over 9 years? 
Hon DAMIEN O’CONNOR 
: This is about today I tell the Minister. This is about the estimates moving forward. What is that Minister’s Government going to do to try to prevent deaths in underground mining tomorrow? What will he do today to prevent the accidents of tomorrow? 
The reports the information the submissions and the hearings at the royal commission all point to inadequacies a totally under-resourced mines inspectorate and people in the job who do not have the skills to know whether they are Arthur or Martha when it comes to some of the gaseous high-risk underground mines. So that Cabinet Minister and his friend there should get off their butts too and encourage their colleague the Minister of Labour whose colleague is in the chair today to explain why she will not properly resource the mines inspectorate to move forward from tomorrow. If the Ministers want any reason to support that they should just go and read the transcripts—just go and read about the gaping holes in a department that not only fails to uphold the wages and conditions of a huge number of New Zealanders and allows slavery on foreign fishing boats in our waters but also allows underground miners to work in an unsafe environment because the department refuses to properly resource a mines inspectorate or to uphold the standards that people warned about right back in 1994. I can say—because it is about the estimates moving forward and about how much resource the department has—that inadequate resources have been given to the Department of Labour and it cannot uphold mines safety.