Kerre Woodham: There's got to be a happy medium in health and safety

The war on road cones has ratcheted up, with the coalition government setting up a hotline for people to report the overzealous use of road cones and no, it's not an April Fool's joke. The hotline is part of a first tranche of measures introduced by Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden, designed to reform the country's health and safety laws so businesses can focus on the necessary and the essential - not on the “senseless and superfluous” as Brooke van Velden told Mike Hosking this morning.

Karl du Fresne: WorkSafe lets itself off the hook

It intrigues me that WorkSafe has apparently let itself off the hook with its decision to prosecute those it holds responsible for the Whakaari-White Island tragedy.

Surely WorkSafe, as the government’s workplace safety regulator, must bear some responsibility for the accident? It must have known tourists were visiting an active volcano. I mean, it was hardly a secret. So why is it prosecuting GNS Science and Civil Defence, among others, while ignoring its own apparent culpability?

Steve Baron: A Travesty of Justice

Persecuted, victimised, abuse of government powers and a travesty of justice are the words that come to mind when you consider what Keith and Margaret Berryman have been through over the last 20 years—it’s a closed case, as far as Occupational Safety and Health (now WorkSafe NZ) and the government are concerned. It’s also a tragic event now long faded from the public’s memory. 

This was a case where the Berryman’s friend, beekeeper Ken Richards, died after plunging off a suspension bridge into a King Country river in 1994. The bridge was erected by the NZ Army on Crown land and funded by the Berryman’s.