Fenton Darien: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeFenton Darien: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 02 July 2013. Volume:691;Page:11557. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]8.DARIEN FENTON (Labour)to theMinister of Labour: Does he stand by all his statements on safety in the forestry industry?Hon SIMON BRIDGES (Minister of Labour):Yes.Darien Fenton: Does he stand by his statement to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee on 6 June that “the message I got loudly and clearly from yes the business owners but also the workers on the ground is that in December we brought into play … this approved code of practice … that this is working it’s starting to work but it does need time to bed in.”?Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Yes.Darien Fenton: When he visited forestry workers on 2 May is it not true that the workers in fact raised a number of very serious health and safety concerns and that they confirm the opposite of his statement to the select committee—that the new regulations for forestry safety are not addressing the key risks in the industry?Hon SIMON BRIDGES: No not at all. I was very impressed with what the young Māori men I talked to said. It showed that they had very good knowledge of this approved code of practice they understood what it meant and it was delivering good safety benefits for them. What is true is that the member’s good friend and my dear friend Helen Kelly did lead the witnesses as it were and asked them very directly a number of very negative questions not about their situation but about what might be happening in other places. What was quite clear—Grant Robertson: And you decided to ignore that.Hon SIMON BRIDGES: No. What was quite clear was that this is bedding in and that we need to do more to get it out there and we are.Hon Trevor Mallard: Why do people keep on dying?Hon SIMON BRIDGES: Well they did under you too buddy.Mr SPEAKER: Order!Hon SIMON BRIDGES: What did you do? What did you do?Mr SPEAKER: Order! The member does not bring the Speaker into this debate.Darien Fenton: Did he listen when the workers told him that many workers were working in very dangerous conditions including working in the dark working long hours and without sufficient support; if so why is he refusing to hold an independent inquiry and continuing to assert that his code of practice is working when there have already been six forestry-related deaths this year?Hon SIMON BRIDGES: What is true is that throughout the 2000s too many people have died in this industry and this Government has done much more than the last Government did to prevent that. The fact of the matter is we have had many documents and many reports. We know what the problem is. Actually we know what the solutions are. We need to give this approved code of practice which came in in December 2012 time to bed in because what I am hearing and actually what Helen Kelly would have heard if she chose to listen was that it is working.Darien Fenton: I seek leave to table a letter from Helen Kelly to the chairperson of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee copied to me disagreeing with the transcript—Mr SPEAKER: Right. Leave is sought to—[Interruption ] Order! Leave is sought. It has been used by the Minister in his answer in terms of the reference to Helen Kelly. Leave is sought to table it. Is there any objection? It can be so tabled.Document by leave laid on the Table of the House.