Wellbeing programme wins top health and safety awa

Ambitious wellbeing programme wins top health and safety award

Education provider Te Wānanga o Aotearoa has taken overall honours at this year’s New Zealand Workplace Health and Safety Awards.

The organisation took out the Wellness category with its effective and hugely ambitious Tau Ora wellbeing programme, which aims to transform the health of Māori nationwide through its staff, students and their whānau. At the end of the evening the judges announced that this entry was also the supreme winner.

Awards were presented at a gala dinner at SKYCITY Convention Centre in Auckland last night, where an audience of over 550 celebrated the achievements of a wide variety of successful health and safety initiatives.

The awards, which began in 2005, are organised by Safeguard magazine and proudly supported by WorkSafe New Zealand. The awards are judged by a six-strong panel representing WorkSafe, ACC, NZ Council of Trade Unions, Safeguard, and industry health and safety practitioners.

Convenor of judges Peter Bateman, editor of Safeguard, said the winning initiatives represented the kind of inspiring developments which would help to engage people in the new health and safety landscape to be fully in place once the new Health and Safety at Work Act comes into effect at the end of the year.

The winners were:

Supreme award: the WorkSafe New Zealand/ACC best overall contribution to improving workplace health and safety in New Zealand
Te Wānanga o Aotearoa

Kensington Swan best initiative to address a safety risk
Fulton Hogan John Holland Joint Venture

Developed a new method of working on overhead masts as part of Wellington’s rail network electrification. Eliminated the risk of electrocution and being struck by trains.

WorkSafe New Zealand best initiative to address a health risk
Tetra Pak New Zealand
Created a dedicated ‘health village’ on each of its large manufacturing project sites so staff can access an occupational health nurse, who also tours the site educating staff about reducing exposure to health risks such as noise.
Vitae best initiative to improve employee wellness
Te Wānanga o Aotearoa

The Tau Ora wellness programme has transformed attitudes to wellness, from being a chore to being widely embraced by its 70% Māori staff.

NZ Safety best initiative to encourage engagement in health & safety
Northern Forest Products, Kamo
Provides a ‘Safety HQ’ powered and furnished container for forest harvesting crews at remote sites to use as an indoors co-ordination point for all health & safety activities, including lighting, seating, whiteboard, safety documentation, first aid and tool storage.

SICK best design initiative
Northpower
A simple but ingenious ladder safety device enables a lineman working alone to securely tie the ladder to any design of pole using a ratchet, tie-down strop and anchor point. This is particularly effective in windy conditions or on sloping ground.

Site Safe best health and safety initiative by a small business
N J Koot Builders, Levin
Developed its own method of building roof and wall framing at ground level, then using a jacking system to elevate the roof and fit the walls. Eliminates the risk of falls from height, and makes the job much quicker too.

Impac best significant health and safety initiative by a large organisation
NZ Transport Agency
Developed a free phone app, the Zero Harm Reporting Tool, which its contractors working on major roading projects use to report incidents, near misses and suggestions for improvement. The data is fed back to contractors via a dashboard to highlight trends.

ACC best leadership of an industry sector or region
Landcorp Farming
Developed the ‘Play it Safe’ campaign to challenge the belief that farming can’t be done without injuries. Distributed safety resources and developed team rules, and initiated a safety benchmarking group with other major farm owners.

NZISM health and safety practitioner of the year
Kristina Wischnowsky, Corbel Construction, Christchurch
Transformed the company’s view of health and safety with a range of initiatives, such as health monitoring, normally only found in much large organisations. Heavily involved in the Canterbury Rebuild Safety Charter.

Edenfx HSE Recruitment most influential employee
Jamie Colquhoun, Causeway Alliance, Auckland
Championed safety red zones to separate people and mobile plant. Had isolation lights fitted to mobile plant to alert pedestrians of impending movement. Known across the project site for his pride and passion for the zero harm ethos.

Business Leaders’ Health & Safety Forum executive of the year
Albert Brantley, Genesis Energy
The company’s chief executive championed a personal safety coaching programme for all staff, and extended it to contractors too. He introduced a ‘stop work’ card for contractors who see unsafe conditions and record safety observations, and challenged his board to visit sites and conduct safety conversations.

Countdown Lifetime Achievement Award
Geoff Wilson, Wellington
For his influential 50-year career in which he led the working party which developed the One Act, One Authority concept, prepared the initial framework for the HSE Act, helped support the creation of Site Safe NZ, developed ACC’s injury prevention programmes for high risk industries, and implemented the first NZ Injury Prevention Strategy.

Judges’ commendation awards went to:
Dr Gill Jolly, GNS Science: for developing a world first risk assessment methodology for people working in high-risk geographic regions such as on active volcanic fields.
Fulton Hogan: for involving Marlborough region staff in designing a safety day, including careful risk assessment, in which their families got to experience heavy road building equipment close up.
Julian Hughes: for his work leading the Business Leaders’ Health and Safety Forum in its first three years.

ENDS

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