NZISM News 29 October 2025

Tēnā koutou

I would recommend that all NZISM members see Pike River. The story of the families’ heroism and persistence in the face of first tragedy and then injustice is extraordinary. Robyn Malcolm and Melanie Lynskey inhabit Sonya Rockhouse and Anna Osborne; they convey both the grief and the humour brilliantly. Another star of the movie is the West Coast; the movie was shot on location and the feeling of being on the Coast is undeniable.

19 November will be the fifteenth anniversary of the Pike River tragedy and many in the health and safety system worry that many of the conditions that led to Pike are recurring. History doesn’t repeat but it often rhymes. One of the ways for us to honour those who lost their lives at Pike is to push for better in the health and safety reform process.

One of the heroes of the Pike River story is Nigel Hampton, KC. Nigel is one of New Zealand’s foremost criminal lawyers. He represented first the EPMU at the Royal Commission and then led the pro bono legal team that represented Anna and Sonya in their journey to the Supreme Court to have the decision to dismiss charges against Peter Whittall declared wrong. I’m delighted that Nigel has agreed to do a webinar for NZISM members on 21 November about Pike River, subsequent events, and his concerns about the health and safety reforms. Don’t miss this webinar.

I’ve been thinking about my old boss, Helen Kelly. Lucy Lawless is a great actress but I think that the movie gets Helen’s portrayal a bit wrong, a bit mopey. One of Helen’s defining characteristics was that she was a happy warrior: She was extremely charming and hopeful even in difficult times. She made people believe in a better future that way. One of the things that the movie gets right about Helen was her unfailing belief in the heroism of working people. Helen helped Sonya and Anna realise that they were strong enough to take on a whole system and she did it for many others as well (such the Forestry families). Helen is enormously missed today not just for who she was but for how she raised people up.

The story of the Pike River tragedy and the reflection that it cast on our health and safety system is complex. Inevitably a two-hour 10 minute movie, even a great one, flattens out the details and is rightly focused on the story of the miners, their families and community - and the grave injustice that was done to them. But history is complex. The Key Government did a very significant amount to advance health and safety in New Zealand via the creation of WorkSafe and the passage of the Health and Safety at Work Act 2015. They mishandled Pike River itself in a range of maddening ways.

The Ardern Government (for whom I worked) honoured the miners by re-entering the drift and not attempting to bury the tragedy and the men. In a remarkable development, it is possible that this work may lead to further changes. On the other hand, we did not do more to pass the regulations, bolster the HSW Strategy and strengthen WorkSafe. I deeply regret not doing more and this current Government has further run these systems down.

We need a system that does justice on both an individual level for victims and their families and a whole of society level to improve our health and safety statistics. NZISM will push all political parties for a system that does this. We owe it to those who have sacrificed in the past and to future generations.

Ngā mihi

Jeff Sissons

NZISM CEO