Just reading through the latest Electrolink.
According to it, there is a Bill before Parliament to dissolve all Electrical Registration in this country.
What is even more scary, is the fact of what is coming.
The current EWRB (Electrical Workers Registration Board), the people that we supported through our COC's will now become the EWLB (Electrical Workers Licensing Board)
The powers of this new bunch of BS have to be read to be believed:
They can:

• Keep, cancel or change any class of licence that they see fit, within the scope of thier "work".
• Prescribe any new and old minimum standards of competence, required to get a Practicing Licence
• If the Board thinks fit that you should not have a Practicing Licence, you shall not have one, for whatever reason, the Board shall not disclose the reason.
  This worries me!!
• Should you be the subject of a complaint, no matter who from, you could be prevented from obtaining a Practicing Licence for life.

How on earth did we get this bad?.
It seems like us sparkies in NZ aren't good enough to grace the Government with our Tax money, God knows we pay enough of it!!.
But no, we get greater powers for those above us (read: a bigger stick to beat us with!)
For instance:

• Cancel your Licence,
• Suspend your Licence as long as it wants
• Restrict your licence by limiting the work you can do.
• Permanently or temporarily deny you your liveli-hood by disqualifying you from doing, or assisting in doing prescribed Electrical work.
• Fine you up to $10,000, for each "offence".
• Require you to sit any examination at your cost, or complete any Competence Programme as the new regime see's fit.

Guys, I welcome your thoughts on this.
This is about to become Law.

I'm a little confused.


If the proposal is to remove all requirements for registration, then how is this new EWLB going to have any powers to do anything?

Paul,
I'm not sure if I know what you mean either?.
Look as far as I'm concerned and this is my view only, Government should keep it's nose right the way out of training our young people and also that of Trades and Services in this country.
We would be a LOT better off if the people that studied 19th Century Economics or Art History or even Hemp production, would stop trying to tell us Electricians how things are.
As far as training our young people is going, it's easier to get onto a "Hip-Hop" course than what it is to get an Electrical Apprentice trained here.
If this is the way it's going, I'd go for the "Hip-Hop" course'.

Trumpy. I haven't received this months Electrolink magazine yet. ( I'm gonna walk down to the mail-box right now though )

The EWRBs proposals will always be about making it cheaper for the government to police the Electricity Act.

Farming risk management out to the electrical industry and then collecting fines for perceived violations is excellent revenue gathering practice.

The EWRB in NZ is relinquishing its duty of policing the Electricity Act and focusing on revenue gathering.

This must be stopped right now ! !

So in essence if someone on the board does not like you they can can you and not have to explain it.

There has got to be a law against that!

And if someone complains (justified or not) they can punish you.

Looks like time to grab your lawyers and fight tooth and nail.

Things like that get me mad enough to choke people with my hands and my feet, and I'm not even from New Zealand.

Robert

Personally I have one problem with this change.
If you as an Electrical worker, happen to get on the wrong side of a client, the media have it these days, that you can place a complaint against that worker.
It might not be for poor workmanship or anything else, but they can complain.
There have been cases of Electricians here being unfairly targetted by the kangaroo court of the EWRB, where the Electrician is subject to intense scrutiny, not by his peers, but by a team of Lawyers for the EWRB.
The thing that I disagree with is an unfairly balanced "trial".
With respect to complaints, I have to disconnect people from our Network, for non-payment of bills, I'm just doing my job but the EWRB has sent me the odd letter telling me not to be so nasty.
Thing is though, you never hear who complained against you or what the complaint was about.
I have to side with Kiwi here.
It's hard to work against the "Invisible Man"

I guess the U.K. is not the only place which is abandoning the concept of "Innnocent until proven guilty" then.

Trumpy, if the EWRB has sent you leters regarding domestic disconnections you have carried out at the instruction of your employer, then that could be construed as harrassment.

Litigate for a lump sum right now !

Look guys,
My one problem with this, is the loss of Registration as a Qualification.
If you got Registration in NZ as an Electrician, you could take that anywhere else in the world and have it recognised, not so much because it was for life, but because you'd done your time in the eyes of the NZ system.
Now it will have to be renewed every 2 or so years, which means you have to pay a fee, of the magnitude we aren't sure of yet.
Just another tax.

AKA: All aboard The Gravy Train! All those fees will go on trips abroad, deep pile carpets in luxurious offices, expenses, vast empires of staff with little to do all day etc. etc.. You can bet your bottom dollar little will see its way back to the electricians. These are the same sort of people who will lay off essential workers like ambulance drivers, nurses or firemen when the books won't balance. They do sack people gently though, calling it 'Rightsizing' or a 'Redundancy Situation'.

"Knock! Knock!"
"Who's there?"
"Sorry,not you, apparently"

Alan

Rob being so far away hit's the nail straight on the head.
There have been a number of publicised cases here where nothing more than a phone call have landed your EC in very hot water.
Most of these cases have come about from where EC's here have refused to connect non-compliant wiring, 99% of the time, installed by the Home-owner on the other end of the phone.
Most of the time they are told to get an Inspector to test/connect the work, that is after all what the Regulations say.
Only an Inspector can connect H/O work.
Some idiots have gone off at a tangent and complained against the EC and it ends up in front of the EWRB.
Now, with thier Kangaroo court, allsorts of nasty things can and do happen.
To close, I just wish that we'd stop being hit with a $K Stick and concentrate on those that are actually breaking the LAW.
35% of Electrical workers in NZ don't hold a Practicing Licence.
10% hold no qualifications at all, yet they are allowed to work within our Industry.
Who's really at fault here?.

{Moderator Note: Paul or Claus, if you think that this is getting out of hand, be my guest to edit or do whatever you feel to this thread, It is one thing that I feel VERY strongly about!}

Whether the rules which are in place (re connecting homeowner's work) are right or wrong, what strikes me as being completely crazy is that the EWRB should start attacking a sparky for simply following those rules.

It would be kind of like a traffic cop pulling somebody over for driving 30 mph in a 30 zone to tell him off for holding up traffic!

Paul,
I hate to say it mate, but this is the down-side of self-certification.
This is why I am all for going back to the old system of Power Board Inspectors and real Documentation of what is happening with wiring in Domestic places here.
Unfortunately, when signing your name on a CoC, you are in fact certifying all of the work in the house, that happened since the last registered person visited, if one did at all.
If someone gets a shock or the house catches fire after you certify, it is up to YOU to prove that you had nothing to do with the said incident.
BTW, Self-Certification was bought in to make things cheaper for the consumer and the Electrical Contracting Industryas a whole.
Just like power here was supposed to get cheaper.
Boy, someone mucked up thier calculations.

Sounds like you're headed for the queensland system, have a read of our electrical safety act, similar legislation in much of australia now. Inspectors exist only to punish and raise dollars with little understanding of the instrument they represent, even the cops are jealous of their powers under law!

Good ideas once upon a time gone wrong...

Spock,

We've had one or two discussions in the past in which the situation in Qld. (or Australia in general) has been mentioned. For example:

How is Electrical work controlled and inspected in your region?

Australian building-site power tools

I seem to remember another long thread about the inspection and tagging of everything on site, but I can't find that one.




[This message has been edited by pauluk (edited 09-06-2005).]