Workplace Health and Safety Strategy for New Zealand to 2015

Rautaki mō te Haumaru me te Hauora o te Wāhi Mahi mō Aotearoa ki te 2015

Why we’ve developed the Strategy

The work toll

Work activities can be hazardous to the health of New Zealanders. Our work-related disease and injury rate is higher than the road toll, and many of these diseases and injuries are preventable.

Each year in New Zealand we have an estimated:

  • 700-1,000 premature deaths from work-related disease
  • 100 sudden deaths due to work-related injury
  • 17,000-20,000 new cases of work-related disease
  • 200,000 ACC claims for work-related injuries.

These deaths, diseases and injuries don’t just affect the individual worker. Family/whānau, workmates and the community all pay the human costs.

Workplaces can also affect the health and safety of customers, volunteers, bystanders and local residents.

To significantly reduce the current work toll, we need to address a range of issues, including:

  • the priority given to workplace health and safety
  • health and safety awareness and skills, particularly in small workplaces
  • the management of occupational health hazards
  • the effectiveness of the government’s interactions with workplaces and industry.

The payoff from doing better

New Zealanders’ overall health will be boosted by better workplace health and safety. In particular, men’s health will improve, as more men work in high-risk occupations. It will also limit the level of impairment in our society: each year, about 6% of people who have work-related injuries are permanently impaired.

Better workplace health and safety practices will also lift productivity and improve the quality of New Zealanders’ working lives. It will make workplaces more attractive, helping us retain our globally skilled workforce. It will also lower the costs of the health system and ACC. The potential for economic gain is significant. New Zealand loses an estimated $4.3 to $8.7 billion1 each year because of work-related diseases and injuries.

1 Source: Aftermath: The Social and Economic Consequences of Workplace Injury and Illness. Department of Labour and Accident Compensation Corporation, Wellington, 2002

What the Strategy aims to achieve

The Workplace Health and Safety Strategy for New Zealand to 2015 provides a framework for the workplace health and safety activities of government agencies, local government, unions, employer and industry organisations, other non-government organisations, and workplaces.

It is aimed at significantly reducing New Zealand’s work toll, and will also:

  • raise awareness of workplace health and safety
  • help co-ordinate and prioritise the actions of a wide range of organisations
  • improve the infrastructure that supports workplace health and safety.

The Strategy is consistent with the Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992 (HSE Act), but has a wider scope. Whereas the HSE legislation places requirements on workplaces, the Strategy includes actions for all levels – national, industry and enterprise. It also seeks to encourage and achieve higher levels of workplace health and safety performance in New Zealand than we would have through compliance and enforcement alone.

The Strategy will ensure we build on past trends and achievements:

  • New Zealand’s current rate of workers’ compensation claims is less than the average for all Australian states.
  • One in four New Zealand workers is now employed by a business that participates in the ACC Partnership Programme, which provides incentives to improve workplace safety practices and involve employees
  • The national death rate from work-related injuries is at least 40% lower than it was 30 years ago.

The Strategy’s contribution to wider government goals

The Workplace Health and Safety Strategy contributes to two of the Government’s goals.

It contributes to the Government’s goal of reducing inequalities in health, education, employment and housing. And, by reducing economic losses associated with poor workplace health and safety practices, it supports the Government’s goal of growth of an inclusive, innovative economy for the benefit of all.

The Strategy supports the development of high quality and productive workplaces, which is one of the goals of Better Work: Working Better, the Government’s labour market and employment strategy.

The Strategy is also part of the implementation of the New Zealand Injury Prevention Strategy (NZIPS) released by the Government in 2003. It addresses one of the six NZIPS priorities – workplace injuries including occupational diseases – and directly contributes to the NZIPS vision of a safer New Zealand, becoming injury free.

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