Thread: Hunting on farm's heaith and saftey

Health and safety obligations/risks/rules on their own aren't actually a valid reason to exclude access for recreational activities, because the process of hazard id and management is theoretically less involved than if they were employing workers or contractors. And provided the recreational user was warned of potential hazards, in the event of an incident the landowner/manager won't be hung out to dry. However quite a few landowners will pull the H&S card to say no, almost as an excuse, rather than just say they'd prefer it if you didn't shoot/hunt/fish/walk on their land.

We deal with multiple farming clients (dozens in an average year), in a forestry capacity so have quite stringent systems already in place, and plenty of paperwork to go through before starting a job. The new act meant little to us, the rules are much the same, the processes the same, it just meant keeping more of a record and having systems that were more repetitive than previously and having a written record of 'everything'. It surprises me how many (the majority) of farmers who don't refer to the H&S act or follow rules at all when we step onto their property. You try and get a farmer to wear PPE (hi vis, steel cap boots and a helmet) when entering a forest on their own property that we are undertaking operations in! We had one farmer ride his quad right through a working skid site, where three diggers and a skidder were working...haha

For larger forests we manage we have a access permit agreement that we will issue at our discretion. It is provided with a list of procedures, conditions and expectations while on the property. A list of hazards most likely to be on the property, plus any ones specific to that property. Maps and fire plans with escape routes and various access points provided. The permit holder signs this if they accept our conditions, if they are found to be in breach of them we can revoke the permit.