Al McCone: Workplace safety must improve

Farmers need to be aware of hazards on their farms.

Twenty farmers died in workplace accidents in 2013. Twenty more died in 2014.

This is an intolerable toll and must be addressed.

On average, 73 Kiwi workers are killed on the job each year, and thousands suffer serious harm.

Four in every 10 workplace deaths happen on a farm.

Apart from the human tragedy, this is costing our economy $3.5 billion per year and it's the taxpayer who is footing much of that bill.

New Zealand's health and safety record is twice as bad as Australia's and four times worse than the UK's.

WorkSafe is only part of the solution.

Businesses, workers, industry sector organisations and regulatory agencies all have a vital role to play and we are committed to working with these groups. Throughout the development of the Safer Farms initiative, WorkSafe continually consulted with and sought feedback from the industry, and continues to do so now that the programme has been launched.

The statistics for serious harm resulting from quad bikes make grim reading:

-Five deaths already this year on quads - 2014's annual total was five.

-The five fatalities this year are more than construction, mining/quarrying and forestry combined.

-Four in every 10 quad bike deaths involved head injuries - when a helmet was worn, no head injuries were recorded in fatal quad bike incidents.

-ACC costs are 22 times lower for quad bike incidents where users were wearing helmets.

WorkSafe knows that carrying passengers on quad bikes increases the likelihood of roll-overs.

Carrying passengers changes the centre of gravity on the quad bike and increases the difficulty of countering this change by active riding.

Clear manufacturer safety instructions in owner manuals and the highly visible stickers attached to the vehicles reinforce the risks of carrying passengers, as do Motor Industry Association and Motor Trade Association guidelines.

From our analysis of 350 quad bike incidents between 2000-08, we know that 353 people were injured or killed.

Twenty-nine of these incidents involved passengers and five were fatal.

Seven of those injured or killed were children (aged under 15 years old).

An issue that is often raised is the farmer's obligations in relation to visitors.

Visitors are the people farmers allow to come on to their farms. Like visitors to any workplace, they are vulnerable to hazards.

If the farmer knows visitors are or will be on the farm, the farmer needs to warn them of hazards arising from work being carried out on the farm. However, farmers are not expected to do the impossible, so the hazard needs to be significant and the farmer actually needs to know about it before the obligation will apply.

Similarly, if the farmer isn't aware visitors are on the farm and didn't know they were coming, the farmer won't be in a position to comply with the obligation, so is unlikely to be held to it.

Farmers do have an additional obligation if visitors are on the farm to buy or inspect goods the farmer is selling, or have paid the farmer to be there or carry out an activity on the farm.

In that case, the farmer will need to take all practicable steps to ensure that hazards arising on the farm do not harm them.

Finally, we continue to read of some farmers' concerns about our inspectors. They are not reporting their concerns to us. For us to address any real, rather than anecdotal, issues we need to know about them. You can contact us on 0800 030 040.

-Al McCone is agriculture programme manager at WorkSafe NZ and has responded to the Insight feature Hawke's Bay Today ran on June 20 about workplace safety, particularly on farms.

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