BRIEFING
Updated advice on WorkSafe’s approach to the Road Cone Pilot
Date:
16 May 2025
Tracker #: 250427
Security:
In Confidence
ACTION SOUGHT
Minister
Action sought
Deadline
Hon Brooke van Velden
Note the information in this briefing
Minister for Workplace
Discuss at the upcoming officials
26 May 2025
Relations and Safety
meeting on 26 May 2025
CONTACT INFORMATION
Name
Position
Telephone
Contact
Sharon Thompson
Chief Executive
s9(2)(a)
Helen Ward
Director, Strategy Implementation
s9(2)(a)
CONSULTATION
Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment
Comments:
Under the Official Information Act 1982
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RECOMMENDATION
WorkSafe recommends that you:
a.
note the information in this briefing, including that:
WorkSafe’s preparations for delivering the road cone pilot are well underway and
include a process whereby digital notifications are received, assessed and then
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channelled into three possible responses as appropriate:
o
Pass the information to the Road Efficiency Group and, where
appropriate, to the Road Controlling Authority (RCA) for action, or
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o
Set up a focused engagement/education session with the relevant
stakeholder to ensure they are clear about what HSWA requires in this
situation, and how following the NZTA risk-based guidance for TTM
supports that, or
o
Send an Inspector to the site for engagement/education - for example,
with NZTA or Auckland Transport, where appropriate; and
In parallel, MBIE is progressing a Ministerial direction to allow WorkSafe to use
the HSW levy for the pilot as per s10(m) of the
WorkSafe New Zealand Act 2013
noted
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b.
agree to change the commencement date for the pilot to Tuesday 3 June, after the
King’s Birthday long weekend.
agree / disagree
c.
agree that WorkSafe will include real-time updates on the pilot in the Weekly
Report in the first instance Official
agree / disagree
the
d.
agree that officials will monitor trends and any issues in the early stages of the
pilot and recommend more regular meetings with your office as/if required.
agree / disagree
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Sharon Thompson
Hon Brooke van Velden
Chief Executive
Minister for Workplace Relations and
WorkSafe New Zealand
Safety
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16 / 5 / 2025
…… / …… / 2025
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PURPOSE
1. This briefing provides updated advice on how WorkSafe New Zealand proposes to give effect
to the Road Cone pilot. The advice reflects and was informed by discussions had with you at
the 30 April 2025 WorkSafe Officials meeting and with your advisor and Ministry for
Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) officials on 14 May 2025.
BACKGROUND
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2. As part of your package of health and safety reform announcements in March 2025, you
directed WorkSafe to:
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a.
implement a digital hotline for the public to report road cone overuse from 1 June
2025, as a 12-month pilot,
b.
train Inspectors to appropriately engage with businesses and road controlling
authorities (RCAs) when overuse of road cones is reported, and
c.
integrate temporary traffic management (TTM) related activities with business-as-
usual Inspector assessment visits, and
d.
work with NZTA and key industry stakeholders to provide education to Councils
about NZTA’s guidance, the
New Zealand Guide to Temporary Traffic Management (NZGTTM).
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3. Following further planning and discussion with key stakeholders and your office, we have
progressed our thinking about how best to deliver on your expectations.
WORKING WITHIN THE TTM ECOSYSTEM TO EFFECT CHANGE
4. Successful system change involves all the participants in the TTM system working together
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to reduce the overuse of road cones and move away from risk averse practices that
negatively impact road efficiency, people and the New Zealand economy.
the
5. WorkSafe consulted with and will continue to work with key stakeholders in the TTM
ecosystem throughout the pilot. These include NZTA (Road Controlling Authority for
highways), Councils (Road Controlling Authorities for local roads), the Road Efficiency Group
and the Temporary Traffic Management Industry Steering Group.
6. We have created a draft process map showing how we expect the pilot to operate, see
Appendix 1. The public will be able to notify WorkSafe by completing an online form,
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readily available on our website.
Appendices 2 and 3 outline draft web interface design
and digital forms.
7. While a minimum viable product will be in place by the commencement date, the capability
of the technology will improve over the course of the pilot.
Appendix 4 outlines a delivery
roadmap.
8. Inspectors will deliver proactive TTM engagements alongside our existing visits and
engagements. They will take an engagement approach to ensure the business is aware of
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HSWA requirements and the intersection with TTM (to ensure over-compliance is not driven
by a misunderstanding of HSWA requirements).
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9. WorkSafe will assess notifications received and determine which of three responses are
appropriate to the specific circumstances:
a.
pass the information to the Road Efficiency Group (facilitated by NZTA) and,
where appropriate, to the RCA for action, or
b.
set up a focused engagement/education session with the stakeholder (RCA or
TTM provider) to ensure they are clear about what HSWA requires in this
situation, and how following the NZTA risk-based guidance for TTM supports
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that, or
c.
send an Inspector to the site for engagement/education - for example, with
NZTA or Auckland Transport (AT), where appropriate.
Act
SUPPORTING ACTIVITIES AND CHALLENGES
10. Communications for the launch and throughout the pilot will be integrated with existing
WorkSafe communications channels – an increased volume of communications or additional
channels will not be pursued.
11. We will report both data (of notification volumes, referrals etc.) and relevant case studies to
inform you about how the pilot is progressing. This information will be regularly reviewed
with your office and can be iterated throughout the pilot based on feedback and trends.
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12. Our initial advice is to include a standing item in the Weekly Report to allow for real-time
reporting, but this can be reassessed if your needs change. This would be in addition to the
regular strategic priority reporting we are developing for you, which would indicate trends.
13. You may also like to consider if meeting with officials more regularly would be useful at the
early stages of the pilot, to discuss any issues as they emerge.
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14. All Inspectors will be put through a basic training course on TTM to ensure they have
sufficient knowledge to undertake engagements. We expect a smaller sub-set will receive
more intensive training. To this end, we have engaged Parallax training, who are viewed in
the sector as specialist TTM training providers.
the
15. Parallax has strong historical ties to the TTM industry steering group and is working with us
to design training that can be quickly rolled out to our staff before commencement and then
continued beyond that point. We anticipate having the first training in place in the week
before 1 June.
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16. Volumes of notifications are difficult to predict at this stage, as are the geographical spread
of notifications. These factors are relevant to determining the most appropriate response
channel. We consider it likely that there will be an initial peak of notifications once the pilot
begins that will settle over time. The seasonal element of road work (generally undertaken
over summer/dry months) is also likely to impact the notifications volume and workflow.
17. We note that your intended commencement date of 1 June falls over King’s Birthday
weekend. While we can still deliver on this date if you prefer, we recommend
commencement shift to Tuesday 3 June, after the long weekend has concluded. This will
help to ensure the public is aware of the launch.
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18. We also note that a Ministerial direction under section 10(m) of the
WorkSafe New Zealand
Act 2013 will be required to allow WorkSafe’s levy funds to be used for this work. MBIE are
progressing this work in parallel.
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NEXT STEPS AND WORK IN PROGRESS
19. We will co-ordinate with your office about an agreed communications approach for the pilot.
An initial meeting to discuss this is scheduled for 16 May.
20. Our design and delivery team continues to mature the process and use experience design
work. We will keep testing our thinking with key stakeholders such as NZTA, AT, and our
own internal resources.
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21. We are in the process of recruiting two additional six-month contract roles to support the
pilot. One role will be a notifications agent to help augment capacity and deal with road
cone notifications. The other will be a business analyst who can help with assessment and
transfer of notifications and help build a reporting framework and provide insights on Act
hotspots that can be used for proactive engagements.
22. We hope to have these roles in place before the pilot commences. AT has also offered some
resource support as the pilot commences, and we will explore options, such as a short
secondment, with them further.
23. Our software provider is developing the digital solution and the web form, and we are
testing mock-ups now.
24. We plan to take a test and learn approach. While the pilot will be largely manually based at
launch point, we will look to continue to mature this where practical.
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25. We will include this initiative in our strategic work programme reporting and provide data
points as the pilot progresses.
APPENDICES
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1. Draft business process map
the
2. Draft web interface (two options)
3. Draft digital form
4. Delivery roadmap for technology
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Appendix 1: Draft business process map
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Appendix 2: Draft web interface (two options)
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Appendix 3: Draft digital notification form
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Design and layout of ‘notification form’ currently in progress. However, it will follow existing
patterns on the public website, with the poss
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ible inclusion of a Google map-UI to allow
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Appendix 4: Delivery roadmap for technology
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– Initial deployment for 1 June 2025 (Sunday) -
web form ( being designed and tested by our
technology vendor).
– UX designing and testing with NZTA and other.
Discussed with Industry Steering Group and
Auckland Transport.
– Process and back-end data collection mainly
manual.
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– Manual triage to look for patterns.
– Link to Inspectors based on notifications and
manual triaging.
– Google maps embedded in the form to
pinpoint locations.
– Email / phone to contact Road Controlling
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Authorities to check on Traffic Management
Plans.
– Initial risk assessment – light touch on launch. the
– Iterative improvements done between June
and November focused on automating where
possible and checking and adjusting based on
feedback.
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