The Royal Commission of Inquiry into the Pike River tragedy has heard a federal MP ignored recommendations to improve safety in the mine, and others were delayed for over a year.
The recommendations on how small mines could improve safety standards in New Zealand detailed in a briefing paper in 2009 were ignored by Labour Minister Kate Wilkinson, the inquiry has heard.
The Department of Labour workplace health and safety policy manager James Murphy made the claims under cross-examination yesterday.
Wilkinson disagreed with the paper’s recommendations for better regulations that required smaller mines to document health and safety systems and hazard management plans.
She also did not agree to introduce check inspectors, or improve the code of practice for employee participation specifically in the mining sector.
Instead, the MP for Waimakariri decided that the department would work on a "strategic approach" to improving employee participation in health and safety.
But by the time Pike River experienced the explosions on November 19 last year that killed 29 workers underground, work on Wilkinson’s version of improvements had not started, Murphy told the inquiry.
The recommendations came from a 2008 review into improving health and safety hazard management in underground mining which was read at the hearing.
"Overall, the estimated impacts are slight and the potential safety benefit is significant, as it could avoid a tragedy similar to one of the fatalities in 2006," the review stated.
The department employed only one underground mine inspector nationwide, with one vacancy after the second inspector resigned a few weeks ago, Murphy said.
In 1998 there were seven specialist coalmine inspectors, and in the 90’s the industry scrapped the mining inspectorate’s at mines in New Zealand.
Read More...
By Jessica Burke on 19 July 2011 For Mining Australia
No comments:
Post a Comment