Drug testing scares off tradies
Tech school drops mandatory testing regime over fears it deters students. By Heather McCarron.
ONE of the country’s largest training institutes is understood to be ditching a mandatory drug testing regime, over claims it’s seen as a ‘‘barrier to education’’.
The Bay of Plenty-based technology institute had trumpeted its mandatory tests, at a time when former Prime Minister Bill English was lamenting high levels of drug-use among young workers.
But now, with National out of government and mandatory drugtesting out of favour, Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology has quietly ditched the drug tests.
National’s tertiary education spokesman Paul Goldsmith warned that it was impossible to keep workers safe in high-risk industries without drug-testing.
Generally, he said, it should be up to education institutes whether they introduced mandatory drug testing. ‘‘However in high risk courses like construction or forestry, it’s important that everyone is able to exercise judgment and show responsibility so you’d expect that everyone is drug free and the only way to know that for sure is by testing.’’
Toi Ohomai was formed from the merger of Rotorua’s Waiariki Institute of Technology and Bay of Plenty Polytechnic last year. Its trades department teaches carpentry, electrical, engineering, automotive and collision repair.
Mum-of-two Katherine Page was a Level 3 carpentry student this year, and is firmly in favour of the test. ‘‘You need to be able to trust your fellow students and make sure they’re fully alert,’’ she cautions. ‘‘Because it could impact your life, not just theirs, if they’re on drugs.’’
The mandatory testing was done on the Rotorua, Whakatane, Taupo and Tokoroa campuses.
‘‘I think it was a good thing,’’ Page said, ‘‘especially being on a building site with a lot of hazards and dangers. If you were on drugs that would’ve made it 10 times worse.’’
Although tests had seen a significant lift in the calibre of its student groups, staff have been told the practice is unlikely to continue, sources say. It comes against a backdrop of a restructure across Toi Ohomai, which is understood to have seen more than 100 employees depart over the past six months.
The results for the first semester in 2016 saw an 8 percent fail rate – mostly for cannabis, but that had dropped to zero at the most recent round of testing in May.
Former head of the trades department John Kelly, who no longer works at the Institute, said that while the testing did cause an initial decline in enrolment numbers, it was overwhelmingly supported by industry, and teaching staff. ‘‘We saw students who were there for very genuine reasons and they weren’t distracted by any outside influences, or even their own recreational habits. They just seemed to be a lot more focused, a lot more dedicated.’’
The practice of drug testing trade students has become quite common amongst training institutes, according to The Drug Detection Agency (TDDA) CEO, Kirk Hardy.
‘‘It’s setting an expectation from the word go – saying ‘be prepared’ because this is what to expect in the workplace, because safety is such an important issue these days.’’
He’s never come across an institute that’s back-tracked on testing, once it’s been introduced.
TDDA conducted more than 140,000 drug tests for workplaces, training centres and job-seekers in 2016 – up from 112,000 the year before.
Toi Ohomai wouldn’t address direct questions about whether it planned to drug-test all trade students in 2018.
In a statement, Toi Ohomai said: ‘‘Our goal is to prepare students for the workforce and we do this by providing safe working environments….We will continue our existing practice of drug testing any student who appears to be impaired by drugs or who are at risk to themselves or others while undertaking practical training.’’
It said courses such as road transport and forestry required mandatory drug testing.