Articles

The prescribed person and health and safety

Since the new health and safety legislation came into place, the term “a prescribed person” has been appearing in several publications. So what or who is this person, and is it a restriction on the home handyman? Why is it important when it comes to health and safety management and especially when...

Avoiding Injury can be as easy as training your staff and providing information

The value of safe operating procedures should never be underestimated and from the enquiries we have been receiving, many businesses are starting to realise this value to help mitigate incidences -see a recent article by WorkSafe. The Health and Safety at Work Act 2015 is very specific about the supply of...

Frustrations with Contractor Pre-Qualification

Is contractor prequalification just about compliance to the law or about making a difference? The challenge to this statement was brought home to me a few weeks ago when I meet up with a neighbour who was spitting sparks, and said to me, "I’m in the wrong business - how do...

Why You Should Use Hasmate for Asset Management

Did you know that your business can use Hasmate for asset management, but also its vehicles, equipment, employee information, and training, and the same program can also alert you when important checks must be made? Over the past five years, there have been numerous work-site accidents involving vehicles and equipment -...

Getting Emotional about Health and Safety

Health and safety is not a topic that you would usually get emotional about, but one gets to a point when enough is enough. A couple of years ago a friend gave me the book “Tragedy at Pike River Mine: How and Why 29 Men Died” by Rebecca Macfie. He said to...

Significant Hazard

What is a significant hazard or risk? Where and how does the term significant hazard fit into hazard management and the risk rating of hazards, and is it still relevant? This is a question I was asked recently and there still exists some confusion as to its application,  and is it or...

Machine Guarding

It's frustrating to continually read about court cases where the lack of guarding has led to horrific injuries. Too often these result in another hard-working family man or woman having to suffer the effects for the rest of his or her lives. Why? Is it because someone never took or allowed the...

Business Planning – planning for the next big idea!

Spotted - an advert on TVNZ 1 for gardening gloves with a difference - some clever person had come up with idea of attaching moulded claws to one of the gloves for digging in the garden, to assist with planting - how clever! Consider this: How often do we see something...

Working with Chemicals Safely

The prosecution of a Tauranga mussel processing company in 2018 for an industrial accident must certainly make all businesses  - using chemicals in any part of their operations - sit up and take note. When you read the following, the incident could easily have been avoided with a few practical and...

The Consequences of Getting Health and Safety Wrong

This is a warning to all businesses after a 2018 High Court judgement that has given guidelines to sentence employers who fail to protect the health and safety of workers. The judgement stems from the 2015 Health and Safety at Work Act and gives guidelines to sentencing people found guilty under...