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Registrar's Review
New Strategic Direction
During this year the Board introduced a strategic plan
designed to establish the direction for electrical worker
occupational licencing for the next five years.
The objective is for the Board to have a business unit as
efficient and effective as it can be, whether standalone or
within the Ministry of Economic Development.
Key drivers for the Board's review were:
- the impact the EnergySafe legislative programme would
have on the Board if the proposals contained in the
programme were introduced, and
- industry criticism of overhead costs, and
- industry criticism of the Board/Ministry complaints
process, and
- opportunities to integrate functions into the Ministry
to achieve economies of scale, and
- staff movements and feedback, and
- the desire to be more efficient.
The strategic changes to the Board plans are:
- to focus on it s regulatory functions,
- to redesign its licencing and enforcement processes and
structure,
- to target spending on communication to registered
workers, high risk workers and industry partnerships for
worker competency auditing.
Full details of the strategic plan are available on the
Board's website at www.ewrb.govt.nz.
Database Enhancement
In May 2002, the Board's new web enabled database was
commissioned and as a first step online licencing was
introduced.
The primary goals for enhancing the Board databases were
to:
- be able to provide registration/licencing and other
services online,
- provide search facilities,
- reduce manual processes,
- enhance management reporting,
- link all IT functions with the Board and the Electrical
Workers Licencing Group to a central database,
- enable the Board database to "talk" to other
databases,
- enhance the administration of electrical workers,
complaints, investigation and disciplinary regimes.
When fully operational the new database will:
- reduce compliance costs to industry
- provide a stable integrated system which sets a platform
for areas such as extended certification on the Internet
- foster e-business.
Use of Centres of Excellence
As a forerunner to the strategic goal of redesigning it's
licencing and enforcement business processes and to leverage
off existing Ministry of Economic Development processes, the
Board commenced using the Ministry's Call Centre which is
situated in Christchurch for 0800 calls. The Call Centre is
used by other business units within the Ministry and with its
22 operators, it is well suited for handling the large volumes
of telephone calls received by the Board, particularly at
practising licence time.
During the review period the Board's finance section was
disestablished and the functions of that section were
incorporated into the Ministry's corporate finance section.
Again this enables the Board to leverage off existing Ministry
processes resulting in reduced overheads and a better level of
reporting.
In the forthcoming year, it is the Board's intention to use
the Ministry's investigatory and licencing processing units in
Auckland for investigation and processing work.
Auditing
The Board's risk based audit strategy has continued during
this year. Eight hundred electrical inspections were carried
out under the Certificate of Compliance programme. In addition
and in line with the goal to ensure public buildings are
electrically safe, the Board carried out a further 600
inspections of schools.
Industry Partnerships for
Competency Auditing
The Board reported last year that it intended building
industry partnerships and to that end the Board has entered
into an arrangement with the Electrical Contractors
Association of New Zealand whereby the Association is
responsible for ensuring that its branded members:
- supervise trainees in accordance with the legislative
requirements, and
- have monitoring systems in place to ensure safety, and
- hold valid practising licences, and
- ensure that all prescribed electrical work carried out
is tested and certified.
The Board considers that industry self auditing is a cost
effective way of ensuring that the ongoing competency function
is satisfied. Instead of the Board auditing a large number of
individual people from one organisational group, one audit can
be carried out on the organisation.
Industry self auditing is designed to ensure that there is
no cost incurred by the Board and this in turn releases vital
funding for the Board to take appropriate action against
people who may be working in breach of the Act.
The industry self auditing concept is available to all
electrical/electronic organisations that have an interest in
electrical worker safety.
Appointments to the Board
During the year lay member Belinda Greer completed her term
on the Board and the Board acknowledges the contribution
Belinda made to the Board's overall objectives.
In May 2002 the Minister of Energy appointed Deborah
Rundle, who has a background in dispute resolution, and Tom
Leong, an electrical inspector, to the Board.
In February 2002 the Board re-elected Murray Willis and
Barrie Mason to the respective positions of Presiding and
Deputy Presiding Members.
Conferences
Board Members and staff attended the annual conferences of
the Appliance and Electronic Industry Association, Electrical
Contractors Association of New Zealand, Electricity Engineers
Association and the Electrical Institute.
Board Meetings
The Board has continued with its strategy of holding the
business section of meetings at its Wellington office and
hearings into complaints in main centres on demand.
This year the Board met 13 times for general and complaints
hearing business and twice in relation to strategic planning.
Advisory Service
The "one stop shop" approach for advice for
electrical workers, implemented in 1999, has continued and
this has proved to be very popular with electrical workers.
Information Dissemination
As previously reported the Board has now revised its
strategy for information dissemination. This has resulted in
the Board now distributing its own newsletter ELECTRON to all
practising licence holders residing in New Zealand at least
four times per annum. ELECTRON is also sent free of charge to
all trainees who have electrical training agreements
recognised by the Industry Training Organisations.
ELECTRON is available on the Board's website and is
designed to keep registered workers fully informed about
electrical matters, both technical and legislative.
The Board's strategy of making documentation available to
electrical workers was continued through the year with a
complimentary copy of AS/NZS 3760:2001 In-Service Inspection
and Testing of Electrical Appliances being issued to
registered people.
During the year the Board negotiated an agreement with
Standards New Zealand which enables the Board to print and
distribute AS/NZS 3000:2000 Electrical Installations (known as
the Australian/New Zealand Wiring Rules) and nine companion
documents to all practising licence holders who reside in New
Zealand. The Board has provided further information on this
initiative through ELECTRON.
Industry Training
As the EnergySafe legislative programme recommends changes
to the manner in which training for electrical workers is
aligned with electrical registration/licencing, and with the
continued development of electrical licencing mechanisms under
the Trans Tasman Mutual Recognition Agreement, the Board
introduced policy whereby people aspiring towards electrical
registration will be required to complete a list of essential
capabilities and pass a "capstone" assessment as a
prerequisite to registration/licencing.
The overarching objective of the policy is that the
training for a prospective electrical worker must deliver at
least the essential performance capability requirements, and
that the capstone assessment will confirm the most critical of
these has been attained by the applicant.
Work on the revised criteria is continuing with the
Industry Training Organisations and in particular the
Electrotechnology Industry Training Organisation Electrical
Engineering Advisory Group's desire to retain
"registration" examinations as an assessment tool
within the National Certificate qualification.
Representation on the Electrotechnology Industry Training
Organisation's Electrical Engineering Advisory Group has
continued during the review period.
EnergySafe
During October 2001 the Cabinet Finance, Infrastructure and
Environment Committee made a number of decisions relating to
the EnergySafe Legislative Review programme.
The Board has commenced work on aspects of the decisions,
which relate to the registration and licencing of electrical
workers and this will continue in the forthcoming year.
Regulation Review
The Board has been actively involved in two sets of
regulation amendments during the review period. The amendments
relate to:
- the safety requirements for works and associated
equipment, and
- the clarification of the regulations and improvement of
electrical safety while minimising compliance costs for
industry and individuals.
Discipline
The Registrar received 68 new complaints this year bringing
the total complaints being dealt with by the Complaints
Assessment Committees to 85.
Of the 85 complaints, 67 were completed during the
financial year. Of the 67 completed, 39 were referred to the
Board by Complaints Assessment Committees.
Of the 67 complaints completed 93% were completed within 25
weeks and the remaining 7% took more than 25 weeks.
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