Worksafe’s new ‘Safer Farms’ approach ignores employment crisis in farming

Workers are worried that the launch today of a flagship safety programme by Worksafe into farm safety, will not work if there is no attention paid to the terms and conditions of employment, as these are contributing to making the industry, and farming work, dangerous.

“The CTU was surprised to hear of today’s launch and to read the Ministers statement that he does not see a strong role for Health and Safety Inspectors in keeping farm workers safe. Agriculture accounts for half the workplace deaths annually in New Zealand and as the Pike River inquiry clearly showed, the State as regulator must play an active role in inspection and enforcement as part of the New Zealand safety regime.” Kelly said.

“The farming industries own annual remuneration report shows staff turnover in the dairy industry at 87% within 5 years (42% less than a year), that average hours per week are increasing and are now at 51 hours per week, that the average hourly rate across all dairy farm positions is just $17.34 per hour, 67% of employers reporting not to have provided any formal training to their staff, and 33% of farmers are saying it is hard to get staff with a growing reliance on migrant labour to fill the gap (20% in dairy).“ CTU President Kelly said.

“The Safer Farms programme does not address these issues. Recent further deregulation of the labour market and promotion of migration will make the work more dangerous and precarious. Government seems to think it can decouple safety from working conditions despite its own Independent Taskforce on Health and Safety clearly saying there is a link. MBIEs own findings that on inspection 2/3 of farms inspected were not meeting basic employment standards speaks volumes that the employment practices in farms cannot be ignored in any plan to make them safer.” Kelly said

“While elements of the Safer Farms programme are useful and targeted the CTU does not believe without addressing these other issues, New Zealand farms will become safer for those that work on them.” Kelly said.

ENDS

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