Source: Radio New Zealand
123RF
A water safety group says Auckland is lagging behind the rest of the country and internationally on making life jackets mandatory.
It comes after the council said it was proposing changes to the region’s navigation by-laws to make the wearing of life jackets compulsory on vessels under six metres.
Under current rules, whoever was in charge of the boat could give people permission not to wear them.
Auckland councillor Alf Filipaina, who is on the by-law review panel, said the proposed update would go a long way towards preventing drownings associated with small boating accidents.
Head of communications at Coastguard Kai Moana and part of Wai Ora Tamaki Makaurau, Kimberley Waters, told Nine to Noon there needed to be more national consistency.
“Every time a region like Auckland Council for example does a bylaw review, the public has an opportunity to have a say,” she said.
“I think that we’re hopeful this time around that people will kind of see the data, understand the importance of wearing a life jacket.
“People travel across regions; we need to build consistency. Auckland has the largest boating population.”
Waters said national legislation was different, which she hoped would change too.
“We need to start to build consistency and it’s time kind of Auckland caught up with the rest of the country.”
Waters said other regions had already made life jackets mandatory.
“There are quite a few regions across the country that already have made life jackets mandatory. Waikato absolutely has seen greater compliance rate,” she said.
“If we also look overseas internationally in Tasmania and Victoria, after they introduced the legislation change, they reduced the number of fatalities.
“That’s something we anticipate we would see here in New Zealand. “
Waters said around 33 percent of people calling in for Coastguard assistance told them they had life jackets on board, but were not wearing them.
She said they would like to see a single consistent rule so everybody on board small vessels wore one.
Water said occasionally they would be told by people that they didn’t need a life jacket because they could swim, or they found them uncomfortable.
“From our perspective, there is support around the fact that when people kind of talk about life jackets being uncomfortable, there are so many different options out there … we really challenge that question.
“Half the time, you wouldn’t even know you’re wearing a life jacket, particularly with the new sort of inflatable ones.”
She said discrepancy around rules across the regions made it more challenging for people.
Waters said their volunteers were facing both success stories and tragedy.
“They want success stories all the time, and in order to have those success stories, we need people to be wearing life jackets.
“No one necessarily expects to end up in the water. But time and time again, it happens unexpectedly.
“Wearing a life jacket is the safest way to help you stay alive if you end up in the water.”
It’s no difference to wearing a seatbelt in a car or wearing a helmet on a bike, Water said.
“Our volunteers want to be able to bring people home to their loved ones from a great day out on the water and not have to, sadly, recover bodies.”
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand