It is strangely fitting that the Tony Sutorius documentary Helen Kelly — Together is screening across the country at a time when renewed concerns have been raised about our poor workplace safety record.
The documentary, about the last year of Ms Kelly’s life, shows her tireless advocacy and activism even as she was wracked with cancer. This included her work with families of killed forestry and Pike River Mine workers. A scene featuring her frustration over a meeting discussing farm injuries and deaths, where there was much pointless posturing and no impetus for meaningful change, would have been funny if it were not so serious. It is worth noting that, of the nine workplace deaths recorded on WorkSafe’s website for the year so far, six of them were in agriculture, including three involving quad bikes.
Many might see the film and weep, not just for the absence of the indomitable force which was Ms Kelly, but because we do not seem to have made any progress since her death three years ago.
Mr Sutorius is among those who have spoken out about the low number of workplace investigations carried out by WorkSafe, which he estimates at one in 100 notifications of serious harm. Lawyer Garth Gallaway, who specialises in health and safety-related litigation, says there has been a significant decrease in the number of investigations since 2016, despite the safety watchdog receiving about 13,000 notifications a year.
He believes it is a resourcing issue. There are not enough inspectors to carry out the work, so investigations are not being done.
Mr Gallaway, in a recent RNZ interview, pointed out the ludicrous justification for the low rate. WorkSafe’s stance was that, in order to start an investigation, it had to be sure the ‘‘evidential sufficiency’’ of the case would be enough for a prosecution. How it can accurately establish that without an investigation is a mystery.
He highlighted some of his experiences of poor communication with those injured in workplace accidents and the frustration the injured felt when their attempts to get WorkSafe to properly review hasty decisions not to investigate went nowhere.
Mr Gallaway is also concerned that officers of a Person Conducting a Business or Undertaking (PCBU) who have a duty to ensure the health and safety of workers, are not being interviewed when notifications are made. In his practice, he had not seen one officer of a PCBU investigated in the four years since the Health and Safety at Work Act came into being in April 2016.
The news that WorkSafe is beefing up its data gathering on deaths to ensure it captures ‘‘hidden’’ deaths, particularly those in the transport industry, is welcome, but what is less understandable is why this has taken so long.
After all, the Independent Taskforce on Workplace Health and Safety, said back in 2013 it was deeply concerned there was not a reliable picture of fatality figures.
Under the new consolidated death counting approach, the transport sector is now considered the most dangerous.
WorkSafe is carrying out research to find out how ‘‘business models and supply chain pressures’’ affect the work-related fatalities involving vehicles.
Safeguard magazine editor Peter Bateman does not mince his words about that. He says long-distance trucking is a broken business model with the risk pushed down to fatigued drivers who break safety rules simply to make a living.
‘‘Work-related deaths on the road have fallen between three stools, namely WorkSafe, NZTA and the police, and they’ve each been pointing at each other in a circle for some years.’’
Where are the politicians from the major parties in all of this? There was much hullabaloo about the wonders of the new Act four years ago, but who is talking about it now? That needs to change.
