• Water Safety New Zealand is calling on the government to make urgent changes to regulations requiring everyone on small boats to wear a life jacket.

• Water Safety New Zealand have directly requested these life-saving changes to the minister of transport Hon. Michael Wood and associate minister Kieran McAnulty multiple times in the last 6 months.

• Since Water Safety New Zealand last contacted the minister in August there have been another 23 drownings. 15 of these occurred on boats and may have been prevented by wearing a lifejacket.

Water Safety New Zealand (WSNZ) are asking all media outlets to please put your collective weight behind our life-saving request to the Government to make urgent changes to regulations requiring everyone on boats under 6m to wear a lifejacket.

Minister McAnulty (Ass. Minister of Transport) has refused to make himself available to meet with WSNZ until Mid-February, at the end of the 2022/23 Summer. “If the record-number of drownings last summer is anything to go by, we are predicting up to 62 New Zealanders may have lost their life by then…I guess Minister Wood and Associate Minister McAnulty are comfortable with this,” says WSNZ Chief Executive Daniel Gerrard

Current, yet dated, legislation (2003) only requires the skipper of the boat to have correctly fitting lifejackets on board. This simply is not adequate and is responsible for more New Zealanders losing their lives unnecessarily.

Chief Executive Daniel Gerrard has once again written to the minister requesting these urgent changes and we need your help to put pressure on the government to save lives.

“Summer 2022 is now upon us, and since I last wrote to you there have been 23 drownings. Such tragedies could be avoided if you and your fellow Ministers agree to introduce the legislation that all persons on recreational vessels of six metres or less in length be required to always wear personal flotation.”

The NZ Coastal & Water Safety survey (2022) affirmed the overwhelming support of the public (93% agree) and boat owners (90% agree) alike, that wearing a lifejacket should be universally mandated. Yet we continue to lack Parliamentary support, to resolve the inconsistency in lifejacket regulations.

How much longer do New Zealanders have to wait, and how many more lives must be lost before we can all agree to affect this important change?

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