NOHSAC Report

Occupational Health and Safety in New Zealand

International Obligations

New Zealand is a party to a small number of International Labour Organization (ILO) Conventions; however, most of these are older Conventions, and New Zealand has not ratified some of the more recent ILO documents. There may not be any advantages to ratifying these Conventions, as the text can provide for very prescriptive regimes that do not fit with the performance-based approach adopted in New Zealand’s legislative framework. Moreover, in many cases, the approach reflected in New Zealand’s legislation results in stricter controls than are provided by the Convention.

New Zealand’s Legislative Framework

Three main Acts comprise New Zealand’s health and safety legislative framework:

The Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992 (the HSE Act) and the Hazardous Substances and New Organisms Act 1996 (the HSNO Act) provide an enabling and performance-based system modelled on the United Kingdom Robens approach. Under each Act, duty holders, such as persons who control places of work, employers and employees and others, are required to take all practicable steps to remove, control, or otherwise manage hazards in the workplace. To ensure compliance, the Acts also give specific duties to inspectorates. The Department of Labour (DoL) administers and enforces the HSE Act in most workplaces. Maritime New Zealand (MNZ) and the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) administer and enforce the HSE Act in the maritime and aviation sectors respectively.

Further detail on how to achieve required performance is provided through more prescriptive regulations, approved codes of practice, standards, industry codes of practice and guidelines, in keeping with the performance-based approach of the HSE and HSNO Acts.

The HSNO Act is part of New Zealand’s framework to ensure that people in workplaces are not harmed by exposure to any such substances. The legislative framework set out by the HSNO Act is similar to that provided for by the HSE Act, in that there is a principal Act (the HSNO Act), a suite of regulations made under the principal Act, and approved codes of practice and approved guidelines.

The Ministry for the Environment administers the HSNO Act, although the Act charges the Environmental Risk Management Authority with many functions. Responsibility for enforcing the HSNO Act falls to the following agencies:

The Injury Prevention, Rehabilitation, and Compensation Act 2001 (the IPRC Act) provides the basis for New Zealand’s no-fault, 24-hour insurance scheme for work-related injury and disease. It also provides a mandate for the Accident Compensation Corporation to undertake activities aimed at preventing and reducing the incidence of injury at work, including the operation of specific incentives schemes for workplaces.

The three main Acts are supported by a number of other Acts and regulations that can have an impact on workplace health and safety (even though this is not a key purpose of these instruments): the Electricity Act 1992, the Gas Act 1992, the Smokefree Environments Act 1990, the Radiation Protection Act 1965 and the Health Act 1956, and regulations made under these Acts or other revoked legislation.

Figure 1

Overall, New Zealand’s legislative system provides for a relatively simple, performance-based and consistent approach to preventing harm in the workplace.