Be prepared in the outdoors
Wild side
Lately I seem to have been spending a lot of time running around filling in forms and ticking boxes. Alas in this modern world of risk-averse bureaucrats, local and central government departments, businesses both small and large have been sucked into a spiralling dark vortex of increasing compliance costs and regulatory controls.
There is no question that all businesses and industries need some rules and regulations to govern behaviour and corporate responsibility, but as always, the devil is in the detail, and almost always requires the goodwill and cooperation of the groups effected.
Reading farming publications recently I’ve sympathised with the growing frustration and angst in the farming community about the ever-expanding regulatory regime and the often perverse bureaucratic outcomes that result.
Water use, supply, storage, payment, and environmental protection are one of farming’s looming issues but so too are Health & Safety concerns on-farm.
Tourism businesses are not immune from Health & Safety processes either, and apart from requiring a healthy environment and ecosystems to operate in, tourism operators take on huge risk in the safety management of their customers paid activities.
The Health & Safety at Work Act 2015 is 232 pages of mindnumbing tedium, something every manager, business owner and director has to grind their way through, being administered and regulated by the Government Department WorkSafe.
There is no point raving on about safety inductions, liability release forms, over-size manuals and over-flowing file boxes but it definitely can get a bit overwhelming and over-the-top at times.
Fortunately safety is a nonnegotiable end result and this is good. Safety is something we should all build into our daily routines – and best of all it doesn’t always have to be onerous or expensive.
Safety to my mind is a consciousness or an attitude, something that is hardwired within many of us. Some people will always be an accident waiting for a place to happen, but with care and thought most accidents and the harsh outcomes that follow, are avoidable or can at least be minimised.
A recent Maritime New Zealand audit on my commercially-surveyed four metre aluminium boat really focussed my mind on Health and Safety processes, fortunately with good outcomes.
While the audit is an expensive exercise, as was mechanical servicing of my boat, plus new auxiliary motor and other replacement safety gear, it’s nice