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Thanks for watching this presentation. What I'm
going to do in the next 20 to 30 minutes is just
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walk you through the new health and safety
legislation. I'm not going to go through it
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chunk by chunk, regulation by regulation, I'm
just going to talk about the main features of
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the Act and why we need to make a difference
in New Zealand. Before I start with that, let's
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just always remind ourselves why we're doing this
thing. These are some of the headline statistics:
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one person every week is dying on average from a
related accident. 15 people are dying prematurely
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from occupational ill health. Whichever way
you look at that – whether it's through the
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lens of cost to the economy, which is about
three and a half billion dollars a year – or
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whether you look at it through the lens of
the tragedies that all these figures show,
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then that's a serious problem and New Zealand can
and must do better. These figures are about twice
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as bad as those in Australia, about three times
as bad as those in the UK. The figure that I just
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want to really emphasise in this is 15 people a
week dying from occupational health exposure. We
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often talk about health and safety – I think
we do rather more safety than we do health,
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but in fact the nature of the problem is
that the health issue is much more serious,
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so we really need to give that a renewed focus.
What we're talking about here is, so I'm going
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to be talking about the legislation but what we
really need is a new way of thinking about health
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and safety. This is about looking after each other
this is about making sure that people return from
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work in a healthy and safe state. That is not
about compliance with every letter of the law,
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this is about making sure that that basic
proposition is cemented in New Zealand businesses,
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and that's what everyone is focused on doing. As
I say, changing the law is only the start – it's
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part of the framework and it's an important part
of it – but making a real difference is about
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changing attitude, which then leads to change
behavior that then gives us the outcomes that
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we want. And if I can phrase it this way: It's
about moving health and safety from something
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that's done on a Friday afternoon once you've
done all the important business of the week,
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and it's something you do not just to make
sure that you comply with the bare minimum
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of what the law requires, it's something you do
because it's good for your business, it's good
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for productivity, it's good for staff engagement,
it's good for your reputation with your customers
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and with your suppliers – good health and safety
is good business. That's the attitude that we
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want to get across. So that's what we're all
working towards: the significant reduction –
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the government has set a target of a 25% reduction
in serious harms by 2020. That's a target that the
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government has set but it's a target for us all.
WorkSafe does not create risk in the workplace,
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it doesn't manage risk in the workplace. That is
the many businesses and organisations out there,
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of which you are part. So, I like to think
of this a target for the health and safety
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system rather than for WorkSafe alone. And we're
going to get there, well, a number of things:
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we're going to be targeting risk – we'll talk more
about this later – but we need to focus on the
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things that cause the most serious harms. Risk
is everywhere: it ranges from the paper cut to
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the death. We need to be focusing on those which
are incidents, which are the serious end of that
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spectrum. We need to be working together, WorkSafe
can't do this alone. We've got to be engaging with
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trade associations with workers' organisations,
with whoever it can be that we work with that can
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give us a big effect for our investment of time
and effort. We need to work smarter, we need to
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have better law – that's part of the legislative
change that's about to happen. We need that to be
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supported by regulations and clear guidance so
the expectations are clear between us and those
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who are regulated as to what good looks like and
what acceptable looks like. And all that needs to
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lead to us working safer as a matter of routine
and as a matter of course rather than as a matter
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of a separate initiative that is taken within
businesses every now and again. So the Health and
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Safety at Work Act is trying to get across a new
way of thinking, making responsibilities clear.
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So, we're trying to shift the issue from what is
my responsibility or, in some cases, when people
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ask themselves that question what they're really
saying is "What is not my responsibility, how can
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I get away with it?", to saying, "Actually, safety
and health is everybody's responsibility". So you
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can bet your bottom dollar that if you're involved
in work, you have a responsibility under this law
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so you better understand what it is and start
discharging it. We're focusing on managing risk
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so this is an important point. Businesses and
organisations are the ones who create the risk
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they are the ones who control it. But risk,
as I said earlier, is a feature of life so
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we're genuinely about recognising what are the
things that can cause us harm, how badly could
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that occur, and to how many people could that
occur, and what we can do to eliminate it or,
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if we can't eliminate it, what can we do to reduce
it to an acceptable level. That's what the process
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of managing risk is all about. We require the
engagement of workers in this process. Workers
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get the bad end and the rough stick of health
and safety when it's done badly, and they get
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some of the benefits when it works well. They
are at the sharp end of health and safety:
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they need to be engaged in the process. Again,
we'll talk more about that later. And importantly,
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the law sets an end to be achieved. It says you
need to be safe and healthy as far as reasonably
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practicable. It doesn't say that you must do it
in this particular way or that particular way, it
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gives you the flexibility to adopt the solutions
that you think are appropriate to your business,
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your environment, and your context. That's good, I
think, that flexibility. It allows you to innovate
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it doesn't box you into a straitjacket. But it
does mean that you've got to do some thinking
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about what that means for you, and you've got
to devise solutions. We can help with guidance,
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and we will. Trade associations can help as well
and others producing their own guidance on what
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good looks like, but you have to apply that to
your own situation in a way that suits you. So,
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where do you start in this health and safety
journey? (And hopefully you've already started).
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But here's a good place. I mentioned earlier
it's not about or managing your risk it's about
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managing the most serious risks. So, if a papercut
is actually the worst that could happen, why would
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you spend your time investigating that paper cut
or doing anything about it. Cut your losses, get
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out of that and focus on the stuff that matters.
It's all about this word: proportionality. The
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proportionality means the effort that you need
to go to in terms of the time, the trouble,
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and difficulty in resolving a health and safety
issue needs to be related to the risks that you're
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trying to prevent. The more serious that risk is,
the more effort you have to apply in making sure
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that that risk is either eliminated or adequately
controlled. So, risk assessment can sometimes seem
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a scary notion to people. I think it's a long and
it's a complex process. Well, if you're running
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a major hazard facility, it does have those
elements. But for the generality of businesses
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and organisations, it's a question of asking a
number of basic questions. What are the risks
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that I'm presented with? What's the likelihood of
that happening? It's a risk at the moment in the
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building where I'm presenting this, that a plane
might fall on our heads – is that a realistic
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risk? No, the probability is extremely low and
actually there's nothing I can do about it,
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so I don't need to fixate on that risk. It's about
looking at the likelihood as well as the degree of
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harm that that risk could give rise to. And then
we look at options to eliminate it. Is there a way
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of engineering out the risks that we're talking
about? Take an example: if I've got a solvent to
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use in a process – is water good enough? Will that
do the job? if it is and you can replace it with
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water, you have reduced the hazard and the risk
significantly by that one measure. Often that's
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not an option that's open to us, so we're then
into the area of mitigating and controlling the
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risk that remains – and that's what minimising
risk is all about. But you don't have to do all
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this from scratch. If there are a well-established
ways of doing things, if there's guidance out
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there which sets down some clear, sensible rules
for how you go about guarding a woodworking
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machine or whatever it might be – scaffolding a
building whilst you're doing some construction
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or demolition work – then use that guidance. You
don't need to work from first principles all the
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time. And over time, the guidance that will be
available to you through WorkSafe and through
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other organisations will increase. So, how does
the Health and Safety at Work Act help? Well,
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this first graphic illustrates how the Health
and Safety at Work Act is organised. It really
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focuses on those people, those organisations
which are key to making it work, and you can
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instantly see from this slide that actually
there are implications for businesses, there are
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implications for workers, there are implications
for senior officers, and then there's a section
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that talks about how businesses need to cooperate
and coordinate their activities to deliver health
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and safety when they're operating in the same
sorts of areas. So, let's pick out some of these
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issues individually and have a look at them in a
bit more detail. But focusing on this point that I
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made at the outset: everybody has a part to play.
So, let's get our heads around the fact that,
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yeah, I'm involved in business, I'm involved in an
organisation, I need to understand how I fit into
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this bigger picture. So, let's start off with the
basic undertaking, the Person that's Conducting a
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Business or Undertaking (the PCBU) which is the
new concept that the law introduces. Basically,
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this usually will not be a person it could
be if you were a sole trader or if you were
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self-employed. Usually would be a sort of business
entity that many of you are working in today. Not
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necessarily a for-profit organisation, it could be
not-for-profit like a government department or a
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charity if it had workers working in it who were
being paid. So, the term is broad and it's the
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PCBU's fundamental duty to make sure that its work
activities protect its workers and protect anybody
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else who may be affected by its work activity. So,
you need to think broadly – not just the people
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who you directly employ, but those who the work
affects. Whether they are customers, whether they
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are visitors, whether they are suppliers,
or whether they are your contractors. So,
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think broadly about who your responsibilities
relate to as a PCBU. And the primary duty of
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care is that you need to take such precautions
as are reasonably practicable for the health,
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safety, and welfare of these people. Health
and safety starts with leadership. Lots of
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things start with leadership, health and safety
is no different. So, what this new law does,
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is say that leaders in a business who are senior
officers of companies – these are people at the
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level of chief executive or board of directors –
they need to exercise this duty of due diligence.
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So, you can see there there's a list of the sorts
of people that are deemed to be senior officers.
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And really the aim of this part of the law is to
say: if there was a model where some directors and
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senior officers in companies thought that they
could distance themselves from the operations,
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"as long as I hear no evil, see no evil, then I
can't be held to account for any failures within
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the firm" – this says: no, you can't do that, you
need to be proactive. That's what this duty of due
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diligence is about – making sure the directors
don't get on their overalls and their spanners
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and go and do the job. But they need to exercise
governance over health and safety, as they do over
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other issues connecting with their business. They
need to have an understanding of the risk profile
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of their business, the key controls that apply
to mitigate those risks. And they need to have a
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flow of information which tells them whether the
policies that they have set and the objectives
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that they want to achieve are actually being
delivered. If a company for an organisation – of
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PCBUs as we now call them – if they fail in their
duty to take reasonably practicable precautions,
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it doesn't necessarily mean that a senior
officer has breached their due diligence duty,
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because it was recognised in this law that senior
officers cannot be all over the business 24/7.
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They just need to have the level of information
that is appropriate to their particular role.
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And it's what I want to make is, that the law
recognizes that very few circumstances exist where
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I as the boss engage with my workers between four
walls or may have no dealings with anybody in the
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outside world. That was never true and it's even
less true these days than it ever was. PCBUs work
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together and, where they work together, they need
to cooperate and coordinate their activities. The
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graphic here is showing a construction environment
which is the clearest example where this operates.
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We might have an electrician working for one PCBU,
working with a joiner who's from another PCBU,
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who is managed by a contractor who is a third
PCBU. All those parties are occupying the same
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space. One creates the risk for the other and
vice versa. So they need to cooperate – they
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need to be having a dialogue between themselves as
to what risks those are and how they collectively
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are going to manage those risks effectively.
So, it requires a degree of planning. Think
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about the stages of work, think about who is
involved in those stages, how the risk profile
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is going to change as the job proceeds. And then
check in with each other as the job is underway
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to see whether the circumstances are changing and
whether we're actually delivering effective health
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and safety on the ground. Think about C words:
communication, coordination, cooperation. Which,
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actually, when you think about it, are the keys
to getting a successful job done. But they're
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also keys to getting a safe and healthy job done.
And also one of the things that the Act recognises
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is that we exist in a world of supply chains.
People design stuff, people manufacture stuff,
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people supply stuff, people use stuff, than
people dispose of stuff. Everybody in those
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chains has a responsibility under this Act to
integrate health and safety into what they do. So,
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if I'm an architect, designing my – what I hope
– will be award-winning multi-story tower block,
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which is made completely out of glass on the
Wellington waterfront, I need to think about:
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how are the windows going to be cleaned?
And I need to build that into the design
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that is then going to get implemented. If I'm
manufacturing a machine or supplying a machine,
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I need to think about what the risks are involved
in that. Can I guard it, can I box it off,
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can I eliminate the particular point that's going
to cause somebody injury downstream? And that's
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important, because getting right at the design,
the manufacture, and the supply stage is almost
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always more efficient in terms of cost, and it's
pretty much always more effective in terms of a
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sustainable solution. So, getting that chain
working effectively is a key ingredient so that
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people who are at the user end of equipment
or substances have had the problem – if not
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dealt with – then at least managed down by the
time they use that equipment or that substance.
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Workers – we mentioned them before, we'll
mention now in the context of who are they.
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Well they're broadly defined, but they could be
anybody: employees, contractors, sub-contractors,
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labor hire company employees, apprentices, and
they could be volunteer workers. Volunteer workers
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being those who are – even though they're not
being paid – are essential to the operation of
00:17:31
the organisation that they work in and who are
doing that on a regular basis. And if they're
00:17:36
of that sort, they're not distinguished from,
in general, other workers. So, workers are a
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broad concept. This also includes other people
who may be affected by work activities. So,
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I mentioned this before: customers, visitors to
workplaces. They're people that you need to think
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about, who need protection from these health and
safety laws. So, workers have responsibilities:
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they need to comply with the instructions and
the procedures which are given them by their
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organisations, and not wilfully interfere
with the things that are provided for the
00:18:14
interests of health and safety. So, they need
to perform that cooperation responsibility
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part of the theme that everybody has a part
to play in the health and safety game. But,
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and I think this is an important key consideration
of the new law, workers need to be engaged and
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they need to participate in the health and safety
process. I mentioned before: health and safety
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workers are at the sharp end of health and safety.
They're in a great position to spot the difference
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between top-of-the-office intent and what is
actually experienced at the sharp end. WorkSafe
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did some research a wee while ago, and this was
looking at the attitudes to health and safety of
00:18:59
workers and their managers across our four key
sectors: agriculture, forestry, construction,
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and manufacturing. And one of the findings of
that survey was there was often a mismatch in
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how well those two communities felt health and
safety was being managed in their business. So,
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if a manager was asked a question such as: "Do
you ever assign jobs to your workers which involve
00:19:25
risk and for which they have not been trained?"
Managers say: "Not very often". If you ask the
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same question of their workers, they say "oh
yeah, that happens quite a bit". What we need to
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do is bridge that gap between top-of-the-office
intent and bottom of the office experience. So,
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get workers engaged and participating in health
and safety. And there are lots of spin-offs from
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that as well as the improved health and safety
performance: staff who start to feel engaged in
00:19:57
the business with their managers. Businesses tell
us that has an enormous spin-off in other areas,
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such as staff engagement with the business
generally, productivity, and general business
00:20:10
excellence. So, we can do this in a number of
ways: there are health and safety committees,
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and health and safety representatives. And health
and safety reps can be used where workers can
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channel their views through a representative who
can represent them on health and safety matters to
00:20:28
their management. Health and safety committees can
perform a role where it brings together management
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and workers to discuss health and safety on a
routine business basis. But the key thing is those
00:20:45
two words "engagement" and "participation". Not
necessarily the method by which that is achieved.
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So, give the workers a voice in what are the risks
that they're facing. Give them a voice in terms of
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asking for their views on whether those risks
are being effectively managed. When processes
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get redesigned, or new equipment gets brought
into the workplace – engage them and ask them
00:21:08
for their views on how risks can most be most
effectively managed in their environment. So,
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I've mentioned a number of features today. I
want to focus on three and bring out three that
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I think are key to successful health and safety
management. The first one is leadership – and I
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mentioned the due diligence requirements on senior
officers before – making sure that the policy is
00:21:35
set right in the organisation, the resources
are committed to effectively support health and
00:21:39
safety, and that those at the top of organisations
have an understanding of how they're tracking and
00:21:46
how they're truly performing in a health and
safety context. I've mentioned workers and
00:21:51
their involvement: doing it with the workers,
not to the workers as a vital ingredient. And
00:21:57
I've mentioned risk management: the meat in
the middle of sandwich, which is competence,
00:22:02
just the capability to understand what risks are
being run in a business and some understanding of
00:22:09
the controls and mitigations that it's reasonably
practicable to introduce to deal with those risks.
00:22:15
If we focus on leadership, competence, and worker
engagement, we'll go a long way to making sure
00:22:22
that New Zealand workplaces are healthier
and safer. Now, we're there to help. We
00:22:28
understand the new law can be a bit daunting and
difficult. So, what we're doing is producing a lot
00:22:35
of guidance to help people through: understanding
the concepts, taking the law off the page of the
00:22:41
statute book and actually explaining in plain
terms what it's about. We're introducing an
00:22:47
ever-expanding body of guidance – not just text
we're producing in documents but YouTubes and
00:22:54
apps that can help people access the information
that they need to be better. Take advantage of
00:23:02
that guidance. Those who fear health and safety
is something long, complex, and bureaucratic:
00:23:06
use these tools and make a start. You will
find that it is a simpler proposition than
00:23:13
you first imagined, but always track back to why
we're doing this. So what is right is that they
00:23:18
go home from work healthy and safe at the end
of the day. So, thanks for watching this but,
00:23:25
more importantly, thanks for what you're going
to do to help that mission and help New Zealand
00:23:29
reduce its workplace toll of accidents and ill
health tomorrow and for a long time to come.
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