Members of our Duncan Cotterill Health and Safety team recently attended the Business Leaders' Health and Safety Forum CEO Summit. The Forum brings together a large group of New Zealand's CEOs (whose organisations have committed to maintaining zero harm workplaces) to focus on getting ready for the new health and safety environment. It was evident that the business leaders present are already prioritising health and safety in their businesses, and personally committing to making this part of the culture in their business.
Panel and group discussions highlighted that attendees were keen to embrace the changes in health and safety and a number of questions were raised about how such change could be achieved in practice. It was particularly interesting hearing both Mike Bennetts (CEO of Z Energy) and Mark Powell (CEO of the Warehouse Group) speak about the changes they have each already made in their respective organisations (in advance of the legislation coming into effect) and the positive effect such changes have had. A major challenge will be to bring smaller businesses and SMEs on board in the drive to improve our workplace health and safety record.
We were also fortunate to hear from the newly appointed Minister of Immigration, Police and Workplace Relations and Safety, Michael Woodhouse.
Duncan Cotterill continues to be pro-active in health and safety initiatives and encourages its clients to join this Forum, which allows business leaders across all industries to share knowledge about safety leadership (www.zeroharm.org.nz/contact).
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