H&S legislation positive for business

Evidence suggests that creating a safer workplace improves a company’s productivity

Professional director David Wright has been on the boards of a number companies on both sides of the Tasman and believes that New Zealand’s new health and safety legislation will be good for businesses.   

Mr Wright recently became the first Kiwi to be appointed to the Advisory Board of The Global Safety Index Pty Ltd, which provides organisations with the ability to measure, benchmark and ultimately improve safety performance.

The Health and Safety at Work Act 2015, which came into effect on 4 April, is modeled on Australia’s health and safety legislation. Wright said that from what he’s seen working across the ditch, it should lead to less accidents in New Zealand. 

“I’m fully supportive of the new act. What it means for company directors is that we need to do our due diligence and be aware of the safety performance of the organisations whose boards we’re on,” he said. “A flow-on effect is that an organisation’s health and safety performance can improve just through people becoming more aware.

“Based on my experience with large building companies in Australia, simply through the awareness of creating safer work environments, the rate of workplace incidents will begin trending down. My response to people who see it as just another compliance cost is that once you create awareness of safety, not only does the workplace become safer, but productivity and profitability actually increase.”

He said that less down time, a reduction in lost-time injuries and people working in a safer manner all link into creating a more productive workplace. That sentiment is supported by an American study, which found that for every $1 invested in safety improvements, companies could expect to see a return of $3 or more.

The findings come from The Executive Survey of Workplace Safety by the Liberty Mutual Group, which involved 200 executives from companies with at least 100 employees.

While Wright hasn’t worked with many SMEs in New Zealand, he says that, irrespective of size, there are ways to create a safe environment.   

An important point to make is that the new legislation is about safety at a reasonable cost, not safety at all costs. People really just need to be thinking about how they can create a safe work environment in their business. 

“It doesn’t need to be particularly onerous. Often all that is needed is a very simple strategy, such as having a toolbox meeting every morning before work begins to discuss what people will be doing and what the potential hazards are, and talk about it how to do the work safely.”

Culture shifting in the right direction

Wright expects that, in three to four years, people in New Zealand will view health and safety in a different light to how they do currently.

“There is already a greater awareness of health and safety across the country. We’re on a journey and I think as the awareness continues to increase, the culture will shift towards being more accepting of health and safety.

In Australia, it’s not seen as a compliance cost any more, but more as an investment and I think that’s where we’re heading.”