Do South Auckland SME need a health and safety system?
Supporting South Auckland business
Winsland is strongly focused on supporting South Auckland business improve health and safety. South Auckland has a relatively high exposure to workplace accidents because it contains some of New Zealand’s largest industrial, logistics, manufacturing, warehousing and transport hubs — especially around Wiri, Ōtāhuhu, East Tāmaki, Māngere and Drury.
A major contributing factor in the high number of injuries in the South Auckland area is the concentration of:
- Quarrying and infrastructure works in the southern corridor
- Warehousing and freight operations
- Manufacturing plants
- Construction activity
- Transport depots
- Light industry
- New town and motorway construction in and around Drury
Accident statistics – South Auckland
Some key points from available data and recent incidents:
- WorkSafe NZ Data Centre reports:
- 70 workplace fatalities nationwide in 2024.
- 37,581 injuries causing more than a week off work.
- South Auckland has experienced multiple serious workplace fatalities in recent years, including:
- A fatal truck tail-lift crushing incident in Wiri (2021).
- A workplace death at a Wiri industrial site (2023).
- A fatal quarry truck crash in Drury (2020).
- A logistics-yard truck strike fatality in Māngere/airport industrial area (2015).
True Cost of Workplace Incidents
The financial impact of workplace incidents is often underestimated. Committing to robust health and safety protocols can work much like investing in an Insurance Policy by reducing these unexpected expenses.
Imagine a small business losing a key employee for several months following a preventable injury. Productivity drops, projects are delayed, overtime costs increase, and valuable management time is spent handling investigations, paperwork, and staffing challenges.
The total cost can quickly become far greater than the investment required to implement a practical safety system.
Beyond direct costs, incidents can also result in:
- Lost productivity
- Reduced staff morale
- Client dissatisfaction
- Increased insurance premiums
- Legal expenses
- Damage to business reputation
Our work in South Auckland
CHEP
CHEP Winsland supported CHEP H&S team for several years as a H&S partner adding resource to the CHEP H&S team to manage major plant upgrades and a country wide programme of guarding and pedestrian segregation enhancements. Winsland also managed the implementation of a contractor management system and a training management system across the 7 CHEP sites.
Elanco
An American company, Elanco manufacture animal health pharmaceuticals in NZ from their Wiri facility, for distribution throughout NZ. Elanco NZ wanted to realise improvements in health and safety system highlighted from an audit by its parent company, against its corporate standards. Winsland was asked to develop a logical plan for addressing the gaps and to guide the local organisation through making the necessary changes. Among the work undertaken, Winsland:
- Revised the site induction
- Developed a new site Traffic Management plan
- Developed a fresh set of emergency procedures
- Reviewed and revised warehouse procures, including those relating to use of mobile plant.
- Developed procedures for driving risk and the risk of staff working remotely on farms and with animals.
The result, was the plan was delivered, and the Elanco NZ met all the corporate standards, with a consequent improvement in what was already a very high standard of health and safety performance.
Southpark
Southpark own a large portfolio of outstanding industrial properties in highly sought-after locations across Auckland, and Christchurch. They engage Winsland as HSE expert providing advice on solar electricity installations on several sites, mostly in South Auckland (Penrose / Otahuhu).
A key focus has been working with contractors to develop acceptable SSSP in order to ensure the work is undertaken using the highest standards of health and safety management. We have also undertaken extensive auditing and provided expert advice on issues as they arose. This protects the contractor staff and manages the owner’s interests as a PCBU.
With this work the biggest challenges have included;
- Working at height – virtually all work falls in this category and uses of fall restraint systems is a key element of Safe Work Procedures.
- Lifts – instituting safe and effective means of getting people and material in-situ.
- Site Specific Safety Plans (SSSP) – as most contractors use Site Safe or other templates which are simply not sufficient as a SSSP covering off the requirement for there to be an agreed site health and safety plan covering he work.
- Supported incident investigations.
- Coached site management on contractor management.
Neighbourhood construction
Neighbourhood directors wanted to ensure they had a sound foundation of health and safety for their company. Winsland was engaged to provide the health and safety framework and support for its very large master-planned community development in Auckland.
Consequently, what was effectively a green fields site was able to engage a very large workforce in short order, set and maintain highest standards of health and safety and complete the development without serious health and safety incidents for workers, contractors or residents. This justified the directors original decision to invest in a quality health and safety framework from the outset.
- Developed the health and safety framework based on ASNZS4801, Regulations and Standards, Approved Codes of Practice and Worksafe guidance.
- Undertook regular Site HSE audits and provided reporting to Directors to fulfil their HSE governance role.
- Drafted the site traffic management plan
- Supported incident investigations.
- Coached site management on contractor management.
Other
Working with other consultancies Winsland consultants have supported a number of businesses in the South Auckland area as diverse as warehousing and car yards.