16 September 2004
Business Complains While Workers Die
“Six fatal work accidents in as many days should shake the compliance cost mentality of even the hardest employer,”
Council of Trade Unions president Ross Wilson said today.
The spate of workplace accidents occurred in several incidents around the country over the past week.
“It is time business leaders stopped trivialising health and safety laws as compliance costs,” Ross Wilson said. “The
message they are sending is that safety laws are an unfair compliance cost on employers, and that New Zealand workplaces
are safe enough.
“And that gives a licence to poor employers not to do anything about health and safety protection for workers.”
It was time for a consistent message, from political, business and union leaders, that the present appalling death toll
was not good enough and that urgent action must be taken by employers and workers to clean up unsafe workplaces, Ross
Wilson said.
ENDS