Health and safety
Health, Safety and Wellbeing Policy
Waikato Regional Council is committed to providing and maintaining a safe and healthy work environment for everyone. You can read our Health, Safety and Wellbeing Policy, below.
Right of entry | Health and safety
Please remember, it's our job to make sure that environmental regulations are being followed for the good of the environment and wider community. This might mean that we have to come onto your property.
- Council officers are permitted by law to enter your land for this purpose.
- Health and safety legislation does not prevent or delay council access to private property.
- Our staff are our responsibility. They have been appropriately trained and are equipped with appropriate personal protective equipment.
- They will take reasonable care for their own health and safety, and they'll take reasonable care that their actions or presence doesn't adversely affect the health and safety of other people.
Our contractors - building health and safety into contract management
Waikato Regional Council is committed to working with its contractors to keep everyone safe and healthy. We do this by maintaining positive partnerships through consultation, cooperation and coordination. We follow the WorksafeNZ guidance on how PCBUs (Person Conductiong a Business or Undertaking) should work together, which includes the following requirements:
Scoping of the required works
Waikato Regional Council will work with contractors and landowners to understand what work needs to be done and where, and to share information about what hazards and risks will be involved.
Pre-qualification of contractors
Waikato Regional Council requires all contractors undertaking high risk work to be registered with SHE (see information below).
Monitoring
Subject to the risk and length of the work, Waikato Regional Council's contract managers will undertake monitoring during the duration of the contract. This could include site visits and inspections, pre-start meetings and site handover, inductions, and project updates.
Post-contract review
Waikato Regional Council will do a post-contract review how the contract went including an assessment of health and safety.
The Worksafe 'Advice when contracting' guide can be found on their website.
Contractor health and safety pre-qualification scheme
Waikato and Bay of Plenty councils have teamed up with SHE Software NZ Ltd to streamline the pre-qualification process. The system will be made available to all councils throughout New Zealand to pre-qualify contractors. This will ensure councils are using contractors who operate with effective health and safety management systems and are holding current and relevant insurances.
This system will help us meet our responsibilities to ensure that contractors, working for or on council assets and/or supplying services, have effective health and safety management systems to prevent harm to people and the environment or damage to property.
Benefits to contractors include:
- easier system that will enable contractors to be pre-qualified for multiple councils through the one process
- improved relationships between contractors and council
- contributing to the WorkSafe New Zealand’s Statement of Intent strategy to reduce injuries by 2020.
- This process requires contractors and sub-contractors who carry out services for (participating) councils, to apply to become pre-qualified every two years, with insurance renewals conducted annually. Should these expire in the system, councils will not allow you to carry out work for them until renewals are received.
As contractors become pre-qualified, company/industry details will be accessible on a database. This provides visibility to contractors and council staff to identify who is approved, assisting with the tendering process and council procurement.
This process is being handled by the Waikato Local Authority Shared Services using an internationally recognised portal.
The fees (paid online) are:
| Number of employees | No. of insurances included | 2-year cost (GST exclusive) |
| Small (<5 employees) | Unlimited | $280 |
| Medium (5-24 employees) | Unlimited | $525 |
| Large (25 and more) | Unlimited | $1025 |
Contractor health and safety pre-qualification scheme applications
Apply to the scheme, using the link below.
NOTE: Please ensure you have an email address prior to commencing your application as this will be required to complete the process.
TIP: Consider setting up a folder on your desktop to save all evidence required to enable easy uploading into the application.
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