Health and safety experts have criticised the Government’s proposed changes to workplace safety law, warning they will neither improve safety outcomes nor make compliance easier for businesses, particularly small firms.
The concerns follow the release of the Health and Safety at Work Amendment Bill, which the New Zealand Institute of Safety Management (NZISM) says is a “big, missed opportunity” to address New Zealand’s ongoing workplace harm problem.
“The new requirements outlined in the Health and Safety at Work Amendment Bill are confusing and could add to compliance costs, particularly for small businesses,” says Mike Cosman, spokesperson for NZISM.
“We are experts who work every day helping businesses make their workplaces safer, this Bill will not help that.”
NZISM says the Bill ignores widely supported recommendations made during the recent review of the health and safety system.
“We see this as a significant missed opportunity to improve New Zealand’s patchy record on health and safety and [it] ignores many of the widely supported suggestions made during the review,” Cosman says.
A central change in the Bill is a proposed exemption that would allow small businesses to focus only on “critical risks”, defined as those likely to cause death or serious injury, while being exempt from most other health and safety duties.
NZISM argues this approach is fundamentally flawed.
“While critical risks that cause death and the most severe injuries are very important, this approach ignores the evidence that most injuries do not result in this degree of harm, but make up 75 percent of ACC’s work injury costs,” Cosman says.
Small and medium-sized businesses make up the bulk of New Zealand firms, but are generally less safe than larger organisations. NZISM warns the exemption could further widen that gap.
“The cost of workplace harm is conservatively estimated at $5.4 billion a year,” Cosman says.
“These changes are likely to increase harm to workers, families, businesses and communities, along with cost blowouts for the Government books in ACC, health and welfare.”
Despite being framed as a simplification, NZISM says the Bill actually creates new compliance burdens.
To determine whether a risk is “critical”, businesses will need to assess whether death or serious injury is likely – a test NZISM says is subjective and unsupported by clear criteria.
“Doing so will require a risk assessment for all risks and is highly subjective as there are no criteria for the assessment.”
NZISM also warns that many serious and common workplace harms would fall outside the definition of critical risk, including violence and aggression in retail, back injuries, some occupational diseases and work-related mental harm.
“These are unlikely to meet the threshold for a critical risk but cause significant harm to workers. The Bill encourages small employers to abdicate all responsibility for addressing these risks.”
Businesses wanting to rely on the exemption will also need to track a rolling average of all people working for them, including contractors, to determine whether they meet the threshold for being classed as “small”.
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden has positioned the reforms as part of a broader reset of the health and safety system, aimed at improving clarity for businesses while maintaining strong protections for workers.
In a statement released on February 4, van Velden said updated WorkSafe enforcement policies are intended to give businesses greater certainty about how enforcement decisions are made and allow issues to be addressed more quickly.
“On my health and safety roadshow I heard concerns about WorkSafe’s approach to enforcement, in particular that WorkSafe can be heavy-handed in punishment when something does go wrong, but not always sufficiently supportive in providing advice on how to manage risks in the first place,” she said.
The updated approach, the Minister says, includes a clearer expectation that WorkSafe considers alternatives to prosecution, such as formal warnings and pre-charge enforceable undertakings, where businesses show a willingness to accept responsibility and remedy issues.
“New options such as formal warnings and pre-charge enforceable undertakings allow businesses who show a willingness to remedy issues and improve workplace safety to do so quickly without lengthy court processes,” van Velden said.
She said prosecution would remain available for cases involving “significant or negligent disregard” of health and safety law, repeated non-compliance, or serious harm where deterrence is necessary.
Van Velden said she had also directed WorkSafe to improve consistency and clarity in enforcement, aligning decisions more closely with the Solicitor-General’s Prosecution Guidelines, and to strengthen guidance so businesses better understand their obligations.
“I expect these changes will sharpen WorkSafe’s focus on prosecuting cases of genuine recklessness or negligent disregard of health and safety law,” she said.
“The Select Committee now faces an uphill battle to make the Bill workable,” Cosman says.
NZISM will make a detailed submission to the Select Committee and is urging the Government to reconsider the proposals.
“This Bill does not do justice to the results of the recent consultation. We urge a radical rethink of the proposals. New Zealand workers and businesses deserve better,” Cosman says.
The Health and Safety at Work Amendment Bill (244-1) is now before Parliament.
