The EWPA and Its Role
The Elevating Work Platform Association (EWPA) represents New Zealand’s Mobile Elevating Work Platform (MEWP) industry — the sector that provides scissor lifts, boom lifts, and other elevated access equipment to construction, maintenance, and industrial users. MEWPs are a significant worksite hazard category: falls from elevated platforms and tip-overs are among the most serious mobile plant incidents in the construction sector. The EWPA’s role is to set and maintain the safety and operational standards that govern equipment maintenance, operator training, and safe use across the sector.
The New Strategic Plan
Following a comprehensive review of its value proposition and organisational objectives, EWPA has developed a strategic action plan covering seven priority areas:
- Industry engagement: deepening connections with both equipment owners and the construction businesses that hire MEWPs
- Industry standards: maintaining and developing the technical standards that govern MEWP operation and maintenance
- Career development: attracting and retaining qualified MEWP technicians and operators in a labour market where these skills are scarce
- Maintenance and inspection compliance: ensuring that the three-month and six-month inspection requirements are actually being met across the fleet
- Improvement and innovation: incorporating new technology — telematics, remote diagnostics, AI-assisted inspection — into industry practice
- Safe use: operator training, pre-operational checks, and jobsite protocols
- Industry representation: engaging regulators, standards bodies, and government on behalf of the sector
Current Compliance Requirements
EWPA CEO Rodney Grant emphasised that strategic plans deliver value only when “action strategies are put in place.” He stressed the non-negotiable nature of current compliance requirements: operators must complete pre-operational checks recorded in logbooks before each use; owners must conduct three-month inspections; six-monthly inspections require documentation; and all equipment faults must be logged and cleared by qualified technicians before the equipment returns to service.
For construction businesses that hire MEWPs, these requirements create due diligence obligations: confirming that the specific equipment you are hiring has current inspection documentation and that operators are trained for that equipment class. Hiring non-compliant equipment creates health and safety liability that does not sit with the hire company — it sits with the principal who deploys the equipment on site. The EWPA’s joint proposal with WorkSafe to review Building Practice Guidelines for MEWP use is expected to provide updated guidance that reflects current equipment capabilities and operational practice.
