Government wants 'proper consultation' to be held in updating OHS legislation
Reforms to the country's workplace health and safety law won't be coming this year as the government wants to be comprehensive in updating the decade-old legislation, according to Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden.
Van Velden told Q + A this week that their planned reforms will be "very and wide and encompassing" and will cover not only workplace deaths but also workplace-related illnesses.
"This is why this reform is not something that I'm hoping to have done by the end of the year," she told Q + A. "It's going to be very comprehensive because if we're changing the laws, we have to get them right and they have to be outcomes focused."
The minister said that she wants a "proper consultation" to be held.
"Looking right back, stripping back the laws and the regulations and saying to every business, person that we can get our hands on and workers as well: ‘What do you actually think the role of health and safety in your workplace is? How is it working at the moment? What would you want to change?’" she said.
Workplace safety data
Data from the Business Leaders' Health and Safety Forum revealed that 73 people are killed in work accidents in New Zealand annually, costing the economy $4.4 billion a year.
It also revealed that there are only 6.3 safety inspectors for 100,000 individuals in New Zealand, down from the previous 8.4 a decade ago.
Van Velden acknowledged the work of safety inspectors, but doubted their usefulness in the field if the laws they're relying on are unclear.
"We're only going to see better outcomes if we're actually asking the right questions," she said in the interview.
"Is it appropriate if we get 1,000 more investigators but they still just turn up to the exact same shops? That's not going to actually lead to any better outcomes."
The minister announced last month that they plan to hold public consultation on the decade-old Health and Safety Work Act in a bid to make it easier for employers to comply with the rules.
"Because I talk to people all the time and they say: 'I don't actually know how I'm supposed to comply,'" she said. "So, I want to clarify those laws and make it simpler for businesses and for workers in the organisations to know what they need to do to keep themselves many colleagues safe."