Goldsmith Paul: Third Readings —Text is incorporated into the Bound VolumeGoldsmith Paul: Third Readings —[Sitting date: 27 August 2015. Volume:708;Page:6276. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon PAUL GOLDSMITH (Minister of Commerce and Consumer Affairs) on behalf of theMinister for Workplace Relations and Safety: I move That the Health and Safety at Work Bill the Accident Compensation Amendment Bill the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Amendment Bill the Employment Relations Amendment Bill (No 2) and the WorkSafe New Zealand Amendment Bill be now read a third time. The Government is committed to improving health and safety at work. This legislation is an important part of that commitment and will play a major role in helping us to meet our target of reducing New Zealand’s workplace death toll by 25 percent by 2020. But robust and effective legislation is only one part of this. We all need to change how we see our involvement in and responsibility for work health and safety to truly have a lasting shift in our safety culture.The legislation delivers a system that gets the balance right focusing effort on what matters by ensuring critical risks are managed while reinforcing proportionality. What businesses have to do depends on what is reasonably practical given their risk and their level of control. The legislation recognises the complexity of modern working arrangements made up of diverse workforces. Moving away from the narrow employer-employee focus this legislation ensures that everyone irrespective of their roles within the workplace has an appropriate level of obligation to make sure their health and safety and that of others is not adversely affected by the work.This begins with the person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) who must do what they reasonably can to help keep their workers and others affected by their work safe and healthy. In practice duties can overlap and PCBUs need to work together doing what they can within what they are able to influence and control to take action that is reasonable and proportionate to the risks. This does not mean duplication of effort. Collaborative approaches will act to improve health and safety and have high potential to drive improvements in productivity.Separate from the PCBU’s duties officers of a PCBU must exercise due diligence taking reasonable steps to ensure their PCBU complies with their duties and obligations. Unlike the current law officers cannot be made liable for their PCBU’s failure. Rather officers are liable only where they fail to perform their own due diligence duties. The legislation makes it clear that officers will be people holding specific positions such as company directors and those who have a senior governance role allowing them to exercise significant influence over the management of the business. This is appropriate. One of the key changes this legislation will help to bring about is a positive health and safety culture. It is those senior leaders who have the real ability to influence the health and safety direction of an organisation and they should. Officers can ensure the PCBU proactively manages and addresses health and safety and how the business operates.The legislation also takes into account the officers’ roles and responsibilities in the business when determining the extent of their duties. Workers and other persons at the workplace also have duties. They will be required to take a reasonable degree of responsibility for their own health and safety and ensure that they do not adversely affect the health and safety of others.Changes have been made to the legislation to ensure that volunteering which plays a large and important role in our communities is not negatively affected. The change means the coverage of volunteers will remain as it is under the current law. Yet the legislation continues to ensure appropriate protection for everyone including volunteers from the risks associated with the work of a PCBU. Community-purpose volunteer associations that do not employ anyone will continue to be excluded as a PCBU under the legislation. As under the present law volunteer organisations that do employ people will have duties to those workers and in relation to the work that the organisation does. A distinction between volunteer workers and other casual workers has also been made yet this does not mean that casual volunteers are not covered by the legislation. PCBUs have an enforceable duty to ensure so far as is reasonably practicable that no one is put at risk from the work of the business. This includes casual volunteers.The revised legislation also provides greater certainty for parties that manage large areas of land so that they continue to provide public access ensuring recreational and leisure pursuits can continue on as they always have. Under the legislation a “workplace” is defined as a place where work is being undertaken or usually takes place including “where a worker goes or is likely to be while at work.” This makes it clear that places are not necessarily workplaces all the time.There has been much comment during the Committee of the whole House stage about changes made to the worker representation aspects of the legislation. Having health and safety representatives or committees was never mandatory. Workers had to first request them. Rather what has always been and remains central to the legislation’s approach is that all PCBUs irrespective of size or risk have worker engagement and participation duties. All PCBUs must engage with their workers and must have effective ongoing participation practices. This ensures flexibility and innovation. Businesses and workers are free to have practices that work for them. The legislation does not exclude small businesses that are not high risk from having to engage and have worker participation practices. Also despite some reports to the contrary it does not exclude these businesses from the main duties. These duties will continue to apply to all PCBUs. Part of a PCBU’s duty is to engage with workers on the development of worker participation practices so that all workers will be able to express their views and contribute to the establishment of their worker participation practices. An issue resolution mechanism also applies and the regulator can still be contacted with any concerns.I would like to thank members of the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee who considered this legislation as well as those who submitted on it. Overall the changes to the legislation have acted to clarify how the legislation works providing an effective legislative framework in which everyone can recognise that they have part to play in responsibility for health and safety at work. Regulations and guidance are also an important element of this and will ensure that a robust and effective system exists. I commend this legislation to the House.