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• Government launches a new road cone hotline today for the public to report excessive, overzealous road cone use.
• Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden wants WorkSafe to become a more supportive regulator, root out over-compliance and change prosecution processes. 
• WorkSafe’s focus should be on critical risks that could result in death or serious injury - not a “safety-at-all-costs mentality”, she says. 

WorkSafe is being told to shed its “safety-at-all-costs mentality” and heavy-handed approach to punishment for a honed focus on managing critical risks and providing clear guidance for businesses.  

The changes directed by Minister Brooke van Velden start with road cones. 

Today, the Government launches a road cone hotline for the public to report “overzealous” road cone use. 

A Cabinet paper, released today, reveals van Velden’s broader vision for the agency to become a more “supportive regulator”, spanning prosecutions, a stronger approach when workers breach health and safety codes and vastly clearer guidance for organisations. 

Traffic congestion due to roadworks on Quay St, Auckland in 2019. Photo / Jason Oxenham 

The Minister of Workplace Relations and Safety wants the agency’s inspectorate to ditch its “adversarial culture” and move from managing risk generally to critical risk. 

Research published last year shows New Zealand’s workplace health and safety is severely lacking. The Business Leaders’ Health and Safety Forum’s 2024 State of a Thriving Nation report found health and safety failures cost the country $4.9 billion in 2023 alone. 

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Workplace Relations Minister Brooke van Velden arrive for the post-Cabinet press conference at Parliament. Photo / Mark Mitchell 

Economist Shamubeel Eaqub, who wrote the report, said at the time New Zealand’s fatality rate was 60% higher than Australia and more than 500% higher than the United Kingdom. 

In the Cabinet paper, van Velden said she wanted to see a shift from a regulator that had a safety-at-all-cost mentality to one that focused on helping duty-holders do what is proportionate to the risks, including rooting out over-compliance. 

Act leader David Seymour holds aloft a road cone during his media stand-up with MP Cameron Luxton in Wellington. Photo / Mark Mitchell 

She had gathered feedback on WorkSafe from a roadshow across 11 towns and cities along with submissions during a public consultation period from more than 1000 people. 

The feedback included businesses needing more support from WorkSafe to understand what they needed to do to comply with law. There was also the view that the agency’s engagements with workplaces could be seen as punitive and instilling fear. 

Feedback around the culture and approach of WorkSafe’s inspectorate and the consistency and practicality of its advice were a concern, van Velden said. 

“It is evident that this has created an atmosphere of fear and uncertainty.” 

A WorkSafe NZ spokesperson said the agency was well placed to meet the minister’s expectations through a new strategy and leadership. 

“WorkSafe is concentrating on the sectors where the most serious harm occurs – agriculture, forestry, construction and manufacturing. And on well-known causes of harm such as vehicles, machinery, working at height and harmful exposures." 

Minister of Workplace Relations Brooke van Velden speaks to the media at Parliament. Photo / Marty Melville 

In the Cabinet paper, van Velden outlined expectations WorkSafe would change its approach to prosecutions after receiving reports from the public that the agency was taking action against parties that were not directly responsible for an incident. 

She used the 2019 Whakaari White Island eruption, where 22 people died, as an example, highlighting charges brought against GNS Science and National Emergency Management Agency (Nema) that were later dismissed. 

GNS Science admitted a lesser charge relating to helicopter flights transporting staff to the island between 2016 and 2019, which was unrelated to the December 9 eruption. 

“I will expect WorkSafe to reconsider its approach to prosecutions, and how to ensure it is focused on cases of clear breaches and causation rather than pursuing novel prosecutions in order to develop case law.” 

A White Island aerial view after the 2019 volcanic eruption that killed 22 people. Photo / George Novak 

Van Velden said WorkSafe needed to strengthen its approach to breaches of health and safety code by workers after receiving complaints of workers repeatedly ignoring instructions, such as not wearing a harness when working at heights. 

Van Velden has written to WorkSafe chairwoman Jennifer Kerr to direct the “significant shift” in current practice. She acknowledged the changes would take great effort but needed to be fully delivered by the end of the Government’s term. 

“I want to see a shift from a regulator that provides generic and high-level “gold-plated” guidance to one that provides advice and guidance that addresses the ‘on-the-ground’ realities of work in a practical way that businesses and workers understand.” 

Van Velden said WorkSafe was “slashing” outdated guidance documents from its website with 50 documents already removed. This would make it easier for people to find what they needed and make WorkSafe’s advice clear and consistent, she said. 

Van Velden had received complaints WorkSafe’s guidance was out of date, did not cover common risks and was impractical. 

“A culture where the regulator is feared for its punitive actions rather than appreciated for its ability to provide clear and consistent guidance is not conducive to positive outcomes in the workplace.” 

Julia Gabel is a Wellington-based political reporter. She joined the Herald in 2020 and has most recently focused on data journalism.