Shearer David: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Shearer David: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers 
[Sitting date: 06 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6262. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
2. 
DAVID SHEARER (Leader of the Opposition) 
 to the  
Prime Minister 
: Does he have confidence in all his Ministers? 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY (Prime Minister) 
: 
 Yes. 
David Shearer 
: Does he have confidence in his Minister of Labour that he will take all possible steps to improve worker safety? 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY 
: I am not wishing to be pedantic but I would point out that it is the Acting Minister of Labour who is now Chris Finlayson and the answer is yes. 
David Shearer 
: Will his Government implement all 16 of the royal commission’s recommendations to improve workplace health and safety in New Zealand including the establishment of a new Crown agent; if not why not? 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY 
: As I said yesterday it is highly likely that we will implement the vast bulk of the recommendations. This may well include recommendation one which is the issue in relation to establishing a separate Crown agent. I will say though that we have had the report for 6 days and there are other examples of independent Crown agencies where they are not necessarily always the best way to measure things. There are pros and cons of the issue and the Government is asking officials for advice on that. It is very possible that we will implement an independent Crown agency but let us just make sure that we have got it absolutely right. 
David Shearer 
: Does he accept that his former Minister of Labour was wrong to reject the safety concerns about underground mines raised by Labour MP Damien O’Connor in May 2010 6 months before the Pike River tragedy saying that there was “visible and credible enforcement” and she did not see any need for a review of the current mine inspection programme? 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY 
: I may be incorrect but I am pretty sure the member was referring to the issue in relation to small mines. That was where the work was actually undertaken. It started as a wider review but it was in relation to small mines in which case yes I think the Minister was right. 
David Shearer 
: Does he accept that there is a lax attitude towards health and safety in his Cabinet given that his last Minister of Labour has resigned and his ACC Minister in June last year said that training of workplace health and safety representatives is a touchy-feely notion; if not why not? 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY 
: No. I think what is true is that in the course of about 20 years there has been a change in the way that basically health and safety issues have been viewed by the Department of Labour. Firstly the primary responsibility has gone to the company and the regulator has taken a view that it can rely particularly in the case of something like Pike River on a high-trust model. I think that has gone in a slightly different direction from other countries like Australia which has had a much more prescriptive regime. We think that the National Government has tried pretty hard to be sensible about this issue but I will make the point that for 9 years—including the time that that member was the Minister of Labour—there were not a lot of changes. 
David Shearer 
: In light of his last answer what action will his Government take to reduce workplace injury rates which are about twice that of Australia and almost six times that of the UK? 
Rt Hon JOHN KEY 
: We have set up a small ministerial task force that will now be looking at the implementation of the 16 recommendations from the royal commission.