Auckland move for KiwiRail health and safety team questioned

The Rail and Maritime Transport Union is questioning a KiwiRail proposal to progressively relocate its Zero Harm personnel from Wellington to Auckland.

“The purpose of the Zero Harm team is to drive KiwiRail’s performance in health and safety. Rail is a potentially dangerous industry and the Zero Harm team plays a vital role,” said Wayne Butson, General Secretary, Rail & Maritime Transport Union.

“They need to work closely with health and safety regulators, all of whom are Wellington based, so it seems nonsensical to us to relocate this team to Auckland.”

“All it will mean is significantly increased travel costs for either the health and safety regulators, or KiwiRail - and either way its the public who pays.”

“Rail is a national transport business and so it makes sense to have the corporate functions where the seat of government is, and also in the centre of the network.”

“Given the significant pressure in terms of transport and housing that Auckland faces, it is also not clear to me why a government department or SOE would want to make this worse by shifting significant numbers of its workforce to the city,” Wayne Butson said.

Ends.

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