New Health & Safety Legislation

[Lanthanide]

The details I posted before were from a grandson-in-law chippie.

Someone has incorrectly interpreted WorkSafe's guidance.

Excellent.
That could be the rule for climbing ladders.
Why not roll that out to every company that has employees climbing ladders?
Consistent message of safety throughout the country.
Or would you rather every company tried to write their own ladder-climbing rule?
I put it to you that few tradesmen-type companies would be able to write a coherent and clear rule that would satisfy WorkSafe.

WorkSafe have already put out their own guidance, which should be used at a minimum: http://www.business.govt.nz/worksafe...tepladders.pdf

Would WorkSafe be able to check the rules that companies write and approve them. And advise if rules are inadequate?

Unsure, the companies could ask WorkSafe. I would expect that it would not be a free service, and just like the IRD, any advice given is not gauranteed to be correct.

Let's say a company has a poorly worded and vague rule about climbing a ladder which the employees follow.
An accident happens and an employee is injured.
WorkSafe determine the rule is deficient and the company fined.
Why wait for the accident to happen? Why not have a template or examples of good rules which companies can use?
WorkSafe doesn't have to write the rules. But WorkSafe could collect examples of good rules that they come across and circulate them to any company that was unsure about writing rules.
Wouldn't this improve the safety of employees?

Yes, which is why WorkSafe have already done it for ladders, which are a very commonly used tool in many workplaces.

Here's a WorkSafe guide to mythbusting with regards to ladders: http://www.business.govt.nz/worksafe...n/myth-busters

Myth 3 | Government is saying I have to spend thousands on a five-minute job – this is safety gone mad

You can injure yourself just as easily on a five-minute job as on a long-term one. You can injure yourself just as easily falling from a two-step ladder as you can falling from a roof.
However, effective safety controls for a five-minute job will be different from a five-day job. The longer someone is exposed to the risk of falling, the more WorkSafe NZ expects an employer or principal to do to manage the hazard.
The Best Practice Guidelines for Working at Height include various options to manage short duration work. The main expectation is that you are actively thinking about how to do any work at height safely.

• Best Practice Guidelines for Working at Height

Just because it’s a short job doesn’t mean you can do nothing – that is not an option.

Page 27 of this document shows the "step-up" or "hop-up" trestle (as in Perry's earlier post) can be used, as long as an appropriate hazard assessment is carried out: http://www.business.govt.nz/worksafe...ing-height.pdf

[Perry]

Binding Decision in Writing Needed?

Real Estate Agents 'Over Egging' Safety With Open Home Briefings And Waivers
21 June 2016

Watch the step onto the deck, use the stair handrail, and look both ways before going out onto the shared driveway. Such warnings from real estate agents to open home visitors are becoming standard practice. The Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) said that under new health and safety legislation agents must take all "reasonably practicable" steps to ensure the safety of people attending open homes and it recommends briefing each visitor.

Communications manager for WorkSafe New Zealand John Tulloch said some of the REINZ? recommendations were an over reaction and Worksafe would discuss them with the industry. If there were extraordinary or significant risks, such as an open trench or a still room undergoing renovations, it was reasonable to expect agents to warn customers, he said. "But as far as normal household conditions like steps and drive ways . . . I think its over egging things to be going that far."

[Lanthanide]

Yip, they're taking it too far.

And as I've pointed out several times before, there is nothing in the new legislation that didn't already apply to real estate agents under the old law.

So if they genuinely believe they need to do these things to comply with the new law, then by the same token they were failing to comply with the old law.

[Perry]

Possibly. But as with the example of my local quarry, down the road, sometimes it's easier to just shut off the customers. When a company has an almost monopoly and incurs no financial loss from doing so, it makes sense. Call it part of risk minimisation as far as is practicable.

Regrading the WorkSafe functionary's comments: when they issue a binding ruling, I'll believe what they say. I suspect that the whole H&S monster would be described by most business in the same language he used: I think its over egging things to be going that far.

And - of course - why does said functionary use a vague and little-known colloquialism? To avoid being detailed, specific and helpful, of course. The last thing WorkSafe would want is to have their style cramped by any such edict.

[eri]

another victory

for bureaucratic bumblers

in killing off individual responsibility

pegasus closes bridge after runners complain of ice on frosty mornings

http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/82139862/Town-barred-from-bridge-developer-blames-health-and-safety-laws

take that business!

suffer for your sins

[Lanthanide]

As I posted multiple times in the comments of that story (which are now closed), the Health and Safety At Work Act 2015 does not apply to the bridge, because the bridge is not a workplace.

There is other legislation that will apply to that bridge, for example the building act, but Todd Property used the HASAWA 2015 as their justification for closing the bridge. They got the law wrong in this case.

Now, the HASAWA does say that a workplace includes anywhere that a worker would normally go on their day to day activities. If a worker did need to access the bridge for a particular reason, say to repair it, then the easiest way to Isolate the slippery ice hazard is just to tell them not to go on the bridge if it is frosty / icy, and if in doubt wait until after 10am in the morning -> waiting until the condition was cleared up by the weather warming up would in fact Eliminate the hazard naturally.

But there's no reason to think that workers of Todd Property would be regularly walking across that bridge.

[eri]

sad that people need costly legal opinions

to give something to the public

most just stop giving

mass-pokemon-go-event-at-auckland-domain-cancelled

On Friday night, the organiser posted on the page that they were postponing the event because Auckland Council had been unable to provide an event permit fast enough to allow an event of that size to take place.

But an Auckland Council spokeswoman said on Saturday that was never required and that the organiser was told they only had to consider health and safety issues.

She said they were contacted by the event organiser a week ago and informed them they didn't need a permit "as there were no regulatory, infrastructure or roading access requirements".

"The organiser simply needed to be aware of health and safety regulations due to so many people saying they would attend," she said.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/technology/ap...main-cancelled

another victory for council's "stay at home and do nothing unless we organise it at the cost of millions" department

[Wayne]

The council didn't say to stay at home?
What does this bit mean?

another victory for council's "stay at home and do nothing unless we organise it at the cost of millions" department

[Perry]

What Next?

Office plants labelled a safety hazard by some government departments
23 Feb 2018

The humble office plant might be on its way out, as government officials label them a safety hazard. Staff at various government departments - including the Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Primary Industries, and Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) - have been discouraged from having plants in the office.The Ministry of Justice got rid of office plants following the Kaikoura earthquake in 2016, according to staff. General manager of property and commercial Fraser Gibbs said pot plants in the national office were considered a health and safety hazard.

[Don't believe the Hype]

Yeah... the oxygen they create can be downright dangerous

[Viking]

Saves the Tax payer the rental cost. whats not to like about that.
Although they will spend it on something else.

[Davo36]

They should set up an office plant eradication team...

[flyernzl]

Oh, no Davo!
Think of the expense of the office fitout, the cost and time spent coming up with a suitable name in Te Reo for their stationery, the payout to the headhunters to find a suitable overseas expert (complete with a dodgy PhD) to run the place, the koha for the official opening, the endless meetings to sort out the leave roster and the conference in some warm and sunny Pacific Island . . .
At least, like the EQC, they would have very little time left over to do the actual work.

[Perry]

Coming to a cake stall / lolly scramble / charity fair near you?

More cotton woolliness from the snowflake crowd.

Homemade adventure park Fernbrooke Farm had to shut up shop
26 Feb 2018

The magic carpet at a man's home-made rural adventure park has landed with a thump after health and safety regulations saw the owner shut up shop. He said he was convinced people were blessed with "good stuff" for sharing with others, and was disappointed he would no longer be able to share his. Together we raised $2100 that was passed on to three worthwhile charities and has been received.

[Nice]

Maybe but I pay experts to do work and expect them to know what they are doing.
Often people wouldn't recognise an unsafe practice if they saw it as they don't know the work so don't know the risks.
So what are they to do?

The problem comes if there is a hazard at your rental property, such as say a slippery pathy or a broken step. While the suitably qualified Tradesman you have employed is carrying in his site safe ladder he slips/trips on a hazard that you as the Property Owner (or PM) ought to have known about; and injures himself enough to put in an ACC claim, then the weight of all Government Departments who can possibly become involved will descend on you as being responsible.

Hiring a suitably qualified Tradesman and having him accidentally fall off the roof is not the issue. That is a hazard only he can take precaution against.