The safety and well-being of your employees, customers and volunteers is paramount. Is health and safety a priority at your RSA?

Following the Health and Safety Reform Bill in July 2015, Workplace Health and Safety has changed significantly. Learn all you need to know about the new HSSE reform bill and how these changes could affect you.

Health and Safety Brochure - a great resource to keep on hand
Health and Safety legislation in New Zealand has changed. The Health and Safety Reform Bill was passed by Parliament earlier this year and will be effective from April 4th 2016. The new law will be called the Health and Safety at Work Act.

What does this mean?

The old Health and Safety law focused mainly on monitoring and recording health and safety incidents once they have already happened. The new law needs us to proactively manage risks to keep people safe.

It is important to know the risks in your workplace, and have systems in place to reduce or remove the chance of accidents and injuries occurring.

If you already have a comprehensive health and safety process, being compliant with the new law is easy.

The safety and well-being of your employees, customers and volunteers is paramount. Is health and safety a priority at your RSA?

Following the Health and Safety Reform Bill in July 2015, Workplace Health and Safety has chanfged significantly. Learn all you need to know about the new HSSE reform bill and how these changes could affect you.

Health and Safety Brochure - a great resource to keep on hand
Health and Safety legislation in New Zealand has changed. The Health and Safety Reform Bill was passed by Parliament earlier this year and will be effective from April 4th 2016. The new law will be called the Health and Safety at Work Act.

What does this mean?

The old Health and Safety law focused mainly on monitoring and recording health and safety incidents once they have already happened. The new law needs us to proactively manage risks to keep people safe.

It is important to know the risks in your workplace, and have systems in place to reduce or remove the chance of accidents and injuries occurring.

If you already have a comprehensive health and safety process, being compliant with the new law is easy.

What do you need to do?

Have a look at your current Health and Safety System. If you already have competent processes in place, then it’s only a matter of checking things off to be sure you are compliant.

A good Health and Safety System consists of eight core elements. A basic System includes:

• Hazard and risk management

What are the risks in your workplace? What can you do to make sure these risks don’t cause harm?

• Incident and injury reporting

Do you have a way of recording any accidents that do happen? Are you learning from them?

• Employee participation

Is everyone on board? Are all employees supporting each other? Do they understand health and safety?

• Emergency preparedness

What will you do in the event of an emergency? Do you have a plan? Is your First Aid kit up to date?

There are many resources available to help, and more will be added as we move closer to April 4th, when the Act will be implemented.

Two great sites to check out are www.business.govt.nz, and Worksafe NZ at www.business.govt.nz/worksafe. Worksafe is the Health and Safety regulatory body for New Zealand.

The new law comes into effect on 4th April 2016. In the meantime here are five things you can do now:

• Familiarise yourself with the key concepts of the legislation. You can find these on either of the two websites listed above.
• Review your health and safety practices.
• Identify health and safety risks in your business and take steps to prevent these from causing harm.
• Lead by example. If you treat health and safety as a priority, others will too.
• Make health and safety part of your workplace culture.

RSA National have arranged for all RSAs to be members of Business Central, free of charge. Business Central provide free advice on HR and Health and Safety. Visit their website or give them a call on 0800 800 362

We also have a deal with NZOSH, to help RSAs create a HSSE Management System at a heavily discounted price.