WorkSafe recorded 70 work-related fatalities and 2,770 reported instances of illness, injury and serious harm in 2025. Construction carries a disproportionate share, and the causes are consistent enough that they should be predictable.
Where construction harm concentrates
- Falls from height, including from heights well under three metres.
- Vehicles and mobile plant, including on-site movements and driving to and from jobs.
- Being struck by falling objects or materials.
- Electricity, including contact with overhead and underground services.
- Excavation collapse.
- Occupational disease — silica, asbestos, noise and vibration, which kill more people than the accidents do.
The height myth
A persistent misconception holds that fall protection is only required above three metres. That is not the legal position.
The requirement is to manage the risk of falls likely to cause injury, and serious injuries and deaths occur regularly from falls under three metres — from ladders, low roofs, trailers and scaffolds.
Assess the actual risk rather than applying a height rule.
The hierarchy, in order
The duty is to eliminate risk where reasonably practicable, then minimise. For work at height that means:
- Eliminate — do it at ground level. Prefabricating and lifting into place removes the exposure entirely and is under-used.
- Isolate — edge protection, guardrails, scaffolding with handrails, covers over penetrations. Physical barriers preventing a person reaching the fall zone.
- Minimise with fall arrest — harnesses and nets. These do not prevent a fall; they limit the consequence.
- Administrative and PPE alone are not adequate for a serious fall risk.
The recurring enforcement finding is a business that went straight to harnesses when edge protection was reasonably practicable. Choosing a lower control because it is faster or cheaper is what the duty prohibits.
Anyone working in a harness needs a rescue plan. Suspension trauma is time-critical, and a plan amounting to calling an ambulance is not adequate.
Scaffolding
Scaffolding above a defined height must be erected, altered and dismantled by or under the supervision of a person holding a current Certificate of Competence for the relevant class.
What follows: inspection before use and at regular intervals with results recorded, a tagging system showing current status, loading limits observed, and no unauthorised alteration. Removing a handrail or board to fit a task is common and serious, and the person who removed it may not be the person who falls.
Notifiable work
Certain construction work must be notified to WorkSafe before it starts — including work where a person could fall a specified distance, excavation beyond a defined depth, and asbestos removal above thresholds.
Notification is straightforward and failing to do it is an offence independent of anything else going wrong.
Overlapping duties
Construction sites almost always involve multiple PCBUs. Each must consult, cooperate and coordinate so far as reasonably practicable.
The main contractor cannot delegate away responsibility for site-wide controls like edge protection and scaffolding, and a subcontractor cannot rely on the main contractor having dealt with it. Both hold duties and both get prosecuted.
Note that the Employment Relations Amendment Act 2026 gateway test, which determines contractor status for employment purposes, does not change health and safety duties at all. Those never turned on employment status.
The occupational health side
A worker is roughly 15 times more likely to die from a work-related disease than a workplace accident, and construction generates several of the major exposures.
Silica from cutting concrete and stone. On-tool extraction and water suppression are well proven and comparatively cheap; disposable masks are the weakest available control.
Asbestos in any building constructed before 2000, requiring survey before refurbishment or demolition that may disturb it.
Noise and vibration, both causing permanent damage that is entirely preventable.
Respirators need fit testing, and facial hair at the seal defeats them regardless of the equipment.
New workers carry the highest risk
Inexperienced workers are over-represented in injury statistics — they cannot yet recognise hazards and are least likely to refuse an unsafe instruction.
That matters given apprentice numbers are more than 30 percent below their 2022 peak and businesses training will be bringing new people onto sites.
Genuine induction on your actual hazards, task-specific training with competence verified, close supervision on serious-harm work, and a culture where an apprentice can say they do not know how — established the first time it happens.
WorkSafe publishes working at height and scaffolding guidance, notifiable work requirements and the exposure standards free at worksafe.govt.nz.
Figures: WorkSafe New Zealand 2025 fatality and serious harm data, and work-related health estimates. General information only, not legal advice.
