Chris Alderson: Construction Health and Safety Chief Executive on changes to scaffolding regulation

Health and Safety experts say the Government need to consider people's lives as they set to change scaffolding regulations. 

Government officials are consulting with the construction sector on whether to relax certain rules on work site scaffolding, making them only compulsory in some situations.

Construction Health and Safety Chief Executive, Chris Alderson told Ryan Bridge falling from height is the number reason people are killed at work globally, but not in New Zealand. 

He says we've been doing something differently that has saved people's lives, so the Government needs to be careful. 

LISTEN ABOVE

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Brook Van Valden wants to change up regulation around scaffolding,
but health and safety experts say relaxed scaffolding rules could
have cost us up to seventy lives in the past
five years. Chris Alderson is chief executive of Construction, Health
and Safety New Zealand's with me this morning. Hey Chris, Hey,
how are you good? Thank you? What's the rule when

(00:20):
do I need to put scaffolding up? If i'm would
it ever happen on a single story house?

Speaker 2 (00:26):
Yeah? Well, there was regulations or guidance that came in
around about twenty twelve, which I guess was the regulatory
shift we saw back then that looked at scaffolding on
single story houses. Now, you know, under our Health and
Safety Work Act, you know, judges take guidance into account

(00:48):
when they're looking at the test for reasonable practicability. So
it kind of like shits the industry on that path
from then. And look, there was a lot of questioning
around that time. I remember it around you know, was
this overreach? Was this over kilder? We barely need it?
And there's been a few organizations that have had a

(01:08):
look at it since then. I mean, brands did a
report in twenty seventeen which looked at the effect of
scaffolding and single story residential houses, and so I found
that yes, you know, there was a cost increase, but
actually there's a major safety improvement as well. And it's
kind of we we've been since then, so we haven't

(01:29):
really looked at it since twenty seventeen. But you know,
if you go out and talk to good builders, smart builders,
what they will tell you is that, hey, there's a
lot of benefits other than the safety stuff around scaffolded
and these opportunities as well around productivity and things like that.

Speaker 1 (01:44):
Right, So, because I think for a lot of people
that single story house example is one that's kind of obvious.
Do you really need it? I mean would I guess
the question is would people have died if we didn't
have it?

Speaker 2 (01:58):
Yes, Look our history of so all around the world,
falling from height is the number one reason you get
killed at work, all around the world, don't matter where
you look, the US, Australia, the UK, except for one
little place, and that's New Zealand. In New Zealand, it's
not number one, which is interesting, right, And you know,

(02:20):
when we look at all the fatalities, we have had
a fulsome heighter around about six percent of them if
you go to the UK twenty eight percent. To get
to Australia round about fifteen percent on average. So you
kind of go, well, there's there's a difference. So what
we're trying to talk about here is trying to talk
about something that didn't happen rather than did happen. Right,
So all you can do is look at that sort

(02:41):
of counterfactual and say, well, what do we do in
New Zealand that made our made us a little bit
unusual and I think our you can really put our
buildings you can put yeah, well maybe maybe our people
are taller. I don't know, maybe gravity works differently in

(03:02):
the door to hear this there, maybe you've had on it.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
So Chris, Chris, these changes the government says are out
for consultation. You know, everyone will get a chance to
have their say. You're saying, actually, it's working fine as
it is.

Speaker 2 (03:17):
Well, I'm saying that, Look, if you're going to make
a deregulatory move, then be really sure about your facts,
because you know, we've all got opinions. We're all entitled
to our opinions, but we're all not entitled to our
own facts, and you've got to really be quite careful,
particularly when you're walking into an obviously higher risk area

(03:39):
where it does actually affect people's lives in the most
serious way. You know, these aren't I mean of a
flippant before, but you know there are. You know, I've
had people on projects or a person on project that
I ran, you know, fifteen years ago, the type from height.
It's not something I'd wish on anybody.

Speaker 1 (03:58):
Chris, Yeah, absolutely, I appreciate your time this morning, Chris.
Thank you. Chris Alderson, Chief Executive of Construction, Health and
Safety in New Zealand.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live
to news Talks. It'd be from five am weekdays, or
follow the podcast on iHeartRadio