SOME BUSH WORKERS 'PART-PAID IN DRUGS'

Rogue forestry sub-contractors were paying some of their casual workers
partly in cannabis, a former Occupational Safety and Health scientist said
on Sunday.

Mark Fielder, who is now the health and safety manager at Waiariki
Institute of Technology in Rotorua, said some workers in forestry gangs
were so indoctrinated in the drug culture they worked in that they accepted
the arrangement without question.

"In remote areas, cannabis is accepted as a payment system. A lot of these
workers are on the dole so they're being paid under the table say $100 in
cash and $100 in cannabis."

Mr Fielder said that in his position with OSH he had come across such cases
from Te Kuiti, the east coast and Northland.

Legitimate contractors were the ones that suffered, he said, as by using
cannabis for cash crop payment the rogue operators were cutting their costs
and were therefore able to put in lower tenders for jobs.

Peter Clark, chief executive of east coast forestry firm PF Olsen and
Company, said that though he had no personal knowledge of such activity,
any sub-contractor working that way was only short-changing the industry.

"Forestry employers won't tolerate contractors misleading their workers
that way."

Economic Development Minister Jim Anderton said he also had no knowledge of
such under-the-table practices, but said that anyone caught would be
subject to prosecution.

He said provisions in the Health and Safety in Employment Act, now being
reviewed and to be tabled in Parliament this year, would tighten
regulations and make illegal payments more difficult to get away with.

Mr Fielder said that in an effort to stop youth who were smoking cannabis
from as early as 10 years old, the institute budgeted $10,000 in the past
financial year for a drug testing programme for its students funded from
their fees. A lot of trainees, as part of their course learning to work in
solid wood-mill processing and on logging contracts with forestry
companies, were required to undergo the testing.