Episode 5: 'Tremolite in the Toy Box - Elle's Story'

Asbestos has been discovered in Children's Play sand during an 'Asbestos Still Kills podcast' late 2025. This results in major retailers pulling children's play sand products from the shelves in New Zealand.

Elle Chrisp tells her side of the story - a positive asbestos result from the play sand she gave to her children,  the decontamination of her house and her journey to discover the truth about a major retailer selling play sand within New Zealand.

Asbestos has now been discovered in Children's play sand all over the world. This is not to be missed!

Elle Chrisp

Elle is the founder of Welle Club, a wellness app designed to make feeling good feel doable, and Welle Essentials, a supplement range created with the same down-to-earth approach she brings to everything she does. But at the heart of it all, she’s still the girl who loves to cook, chat about wellness, and connect with others trying to do the same.

www.welleclub.com
instagram.com/elleherself

To donate to the research into Childrens play sand testing, link HERE

Presenters:

Robert McAllister - FAMANZ Director

Dr. Terri-Ann Berry - Environmental Innovation Centre (EIC); Associate Professor, AUT, School of Future Environments

Jason Milner - Asbestos Management Consultants Ltd (AMC)

Website: www.asbestosstillkills.com

Email: asbestosstillkills@gmail.com

The Asbestos Still Kills Podcast ® is Sponsored by:

Asbestos Management Consultants Ltd - Expertise you can trust

https://asbestosmanagementconsultants.co.nz/

The Environmental Innovation Centre

https://www.environmental-innovation.nz/

For information on asbestos-related diseases or to contact the Mesothelioma Support and Asbestos Awareness Trust please go to:

https://www.msaatrust.org.nz/

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Transcript

What to expect in this episode

Speaker 3 0:01

Asbestos still kills.

Speaker 4 0:16

On the other hand, we're importing the material with asbestos in it. And our children are playing with it.

Speaker 7 0:24

Yeah, that's when things quickly took a turn when we found out that we had that positive result. You know, when like we got that, when I got that call, immediately after I got off the phone, I fell to the ground, like stopping. Because I handed that to my kids. Get out of the house as quickly as we could, close windows, turn off the air circulating that was happening. With our children being younger, uh, the type of fibers having that needle-like fibres, they deemed that to be a high risk that wasn't worth kind of gambling with as well.

Speaker 6 1:10

But again, yeah, it's gobsmacking really that this can happen.

Speaker 7 1:16

Kmart took out messaging around consumer rights. They wanted that off the recall notice. And the government complied.

Why Asbestos In Toys Matters

Speaker 3 1:28

So as a parent, I would not allow my children to play with coloured stamp. Episode five. Asbestos in children's play stand. This is Elle's story. For listening to the asbestos still kills podcast. Please see the disclaimer on the website www.asbestos stillkills.com. Thank you. Welcome to the asbestos still kills podcast. I am Jason Milner.

Speaker 6 2:13

I'm Terry Ann Berry.

Speaker 3 2:15

I'm Rob McAllister. Tremolite in the toy box. The asbestos and recall no one saw coming. In this podcast, we will be discussing the impact of the discovery of asbestos in children's playsand. What has happened since our last podcast about the asbestos play sand, how widespread the issue appears to be, and how we can learn from this. As our special guest today, we are delighted to welcome Elle Chrisp. Welcome to the team, Elle.

Speaker 7 2:55

Hi, thank you for having me. I have to be honest, I feel way out of my depth sitting here today with people who have spent their careers in this space, and I came to it through a children's toy.

Speaker 6 3:09

Actually, I think it's so important that we've got all the different perspectives, and you've got so much more to add than you can possibly imagine.

Speaker 7 3:16

Well, I think it's interesting because a lot of people grappling with this probably are exactly like me and had no idea what tremolite is at all. So thank you for having me on to talk about this.

Speaker 4 3:37

So great, I've had a look at that. Elle was uh really quite impressive. She's also a mum of two young twins who loved playing with the Magic Sand products, which Elle purchased from Kmart.

Meeting Elle And The Recall Discovery

Speaker 6 3:51

So we're really looking forward to today because Elle is going to talk a little bit about her experience from both a personal perspective but also from the perspective of someone who understands consumer law. And I hope I'm right in saying that the rest of us really don't have that much idea, although Rob really does because he knows a bit about everything. Um, but for me, this is going to be fantastic. So while she no longer practices law, Elle's going to help us understand our rights in this type of situation. So really excited about this. Stay tuned, everybody, and let's start looking into children's plays and so, Elle, let's start off with the usual question that we ask all of our guests. Can you tell us a bit more about yourself and your background?

Speaker 7 4:32

Yes, as Rob said, I was practicing as a lawyer, sharing the food that I was making, I've always loved recipes. That grew very unexpectedly. That now I have a healthy lifestyle and recipe app and also a supplement range. But uh the background, the legal background that I have ended up being quite useful when it came to this situation, getting through documents and researching, and it is helpful to have that consumer law sort of understanding too.

Speaker 6 5:02

Yeah, look, it's it must be so helpful to actually have that background in this sort of situation. Um, how did you find out about the asbestos in the sand products and what was your initial reaction?

Speaker 7 5:14

I was on Instagram and I saw an Instagram story from Kmart and it had recall notice, and it looked very familiar because I had that product. And the word asbestos was in a recall notice, which shocked me because I actually was one of Kmart's bit embarrassing how much money I probably spent there over the years. I was there all too frequently with young children trying to find ways to sort of save money and shop around. So I was a frequent purchaser, and that was the first time I had seen something that I had bought in a recall with that kind of language used. So that's how we found out.

Speaker 6 5:57

Yeah, so managing to keep Kmart afloat on your own, which is pretty impressive. Can you tell us a little bit about your initial reaction when you saw that?

Speaker 7 6:05

You know, immediate shock and a little bit of disbelief, but the language in the recall notice felt quite calm. So I was like, okay, we're not to panic, everything is fine here. Uh but what I had, I I didn't know about asbestos much, other than you don't want it, you don't want to be around it, was my understanding, and that it was dangerous. Um, but yeah, it just I needed to sort of learn more. So I started, I immediately went on to TikTok, Instagram, search, trying to find information. There was no one speaking about it, but I was able to find news articles that linked me back to your podcast. So your podcast became a source, like a key source material for me, uh, to sort of understand how this happened and what was going on.

Speaker 6 7:10

Yeah, so for those listeners out there who don't already know, um, we interviewed uh uh somebody working in a lab who was talking about places where he found asbestos that were unusual and uh the sand cropped up at that appointment. Um I wasn't there on that day. Uh that was Rob and Jace who uh who had that conversation and it kind of all went from there. Um and to be fair for myself, I'm really glad that that that conversation was had. Um what about the rest of the team? Did you, when you saw it, you know it's a bit like when um JFK got shot, you know what you were doing? I actually not that old, I can just my mum's then she was doing the ironing. Okay, when the Twin Towers went down, we can all remember exactly what we were doing. Is this a similar situation? Can you remember what you were doing and what you thought? Uh Jace?

Speaker 3 7:55

I remember doing the podcast with uh Michael Shepherd from Corlabs, and we were stunned. Umself and Rob were both stunned. I asked him the question, what's the what's the weirdest place you've ever found? Aspecitist, and they said our coloured sand, but actually children's place. And it took us into a whole new level of uh questions. And Rob was asking the question, Well, if it's over there over in Australia, is it over uh over in New Zealand? We're both pretty uh pretty gobsmacked. Do you wanna evaluate on that Rob?

Speaker 4 8:33

Yeah, I mean gobsmack is the word because as soon as I heard that, my mind directly went to my grandchildren who I knew were playing with this stuff. And um, you know, it wasn't something that was around necessarily when I was at school. I mean, I won't say my age, but I mean it's a few years ago now. But uh I knew that it was quite popular now and I just kept thinking and I kept asking the same questions and saying, you know, wow, why? You know, and my mind was racing a mile a minute and I was thinking, okay, it's there we share a pretty common market between New Zealand and Australia when it comes to products. We're very similar in those places. So yeah, I honestly I was sort of getting through the podcast and I couldn't help but think I said I need to contact the regulator because I had a meeting already scheduled with a regulator that I have every month through my Faman's connections, and I was like, Well, I need to have a conversation with the uh regulator about this as soon as we sort of get out, and um which I did, and I I took that forward with the regulator, and the regulator, luckily in New Zealand, was so conscientious of it and like us was completely alarmed, and um you know, following our meeting and discussions, decided to reach out to colleagues in Australia to try and get some insight from Australia, and at the same time uh in New Zealand I realized that we really hadn't had any positive results as such. So uh through Famand, I instructed a lab um survey company to go out and buy some products. So we instantaneously said, Okay, let's have a look at our biggest suppliers in New Zealand and uh came up with one of those suppliers. We also went to the warehouse and several other suppliers, and we just literally went to the shops, bought the products and took them back and and started testing them from that particular point going forwards, you know, it all started to unravel pretty quickly.

Speaker 7 10:38

I I have to say a huge thank you to you both. First of all, I I don't know if you've seen it, but I've actually clipped that exact moment where you find out because that moment, my husband and I, we watched that through quite a few times. And we that was the when things started to sort of dawn on me that the reaction from those who have the expertise doesn't match what the language is that I'm being told as a member of the public, and that put me on notice that so but thank you for all of the actions that you took because I'm sure it's no one likes the messenger, right? You know?

How Kinetic Sand Spreads At Home

Speaker 3 11:20

Yeah, sorry to hear about your your children playing with the sand. How were the how were they using the sand and was it contained in one area?

Speaker 7 11:32

This is the part that makes this just so nefarious because there's not one use case. Um I believed it was safe, and I actually kind of felt a sense of relief actually when they were playing with it, because as somebody who shares their life or aspects of my life online, you do get criticism from time to time. And we've traveled with our twins since they were our first trip overseas with them, it was at six months old, and it was about 18 months old, where they uh started to get quite challenging. And so, taking a device with us on the airplane, you'd get maybe five minutes of containment before they were bored. So um, people had seen that they had been in front of screens, and that can make people feel a certain way. So I almost felt like I was doing the right thing by having them play with sand, and they would create little imaginary lands with their toys and cars and driving things over it. And the first time I remember getting it and they played with it inside, I was a bit horrified how hard it was to clean up out of my carpet. I thought I had like stained my carpet. That was one of the sand products. There were so many, and unfortunately, I bought a bunch of them. Um, the one that was in the recall notice that we had the positive test for, that Tremolite test for, was the Sandcastle building set, the 14-piece or 12-piece, can't remember. We had two of those, and by that stage, I had moved that product outside. So when we got it, we had um an outside kind of chest. The twins have a sand pit as well. And when they played outside, we would just kind of open everything up. They had like a mud, you know, a wet kitchen so they could make mud pies. And I personally have taken the approach of I like to encourage them to just go crazy. Like you're only little once and you learn through exploration. And so I don't try to contain them in my outside space. So they would take some of the their kinetic sand and put them in their sand pit, and then at the end of it, it would just be everywhere in the grass, on our deck, um, on the pavers. But again, I didn't mind because this was all to them part of their play. And we would go out and do our best to pick it up and put it back in the tub and clean it up, but over time it had filtered its way through everything. But thankfully, yeah, they played with it outside. That one.

Speaker 3 14:21

So, did you think it had been tested before? Before it had been given to children.

Speaker 7 14:27

I assumed it was safe. I just assumed that asbestos was something you deal with when you are in a building and it's you know, that is what I thought. I didn't think it came in consumer products at all. Other than I had heard of it in makeup or in telc in the Johnson and Johnson instance.

Speaker 3 14:50

Well, you probably thought it was it was tested, tested before it was given up to children, or just yeah, put out onto the market.

Speaker 7 14:59

Absolutely. I I I thought from all the messaging that children's toys was safe. Kmart is a reputable brand. You hear things about, oh, you know, buying it from this store, this online website or this. Fair enough, you know, that might be the Wild West, but this is something in which our government has, you know, a watchover, right?

Speaker 5 15:22

Yeah.

Speaker 7 15:23

They're answerable to that. Um, so yeah, I definitely had a false sense of security. So to hear in that interview you did almost um not from you, it didn't feel casual, but it almost felt casual from the guests, like, oh yeah, we found it there. It's like, what? Uh what? Knowing the way in which young kids play with it, it's not just like, you know, you're that far away from it. They, my kids were right up close and they played with it from I want to say that they were under two when they were playing with it, because it's like a sensory thing, right? And there were many times when they were playing with it outside, and I took out snacks and drinks, and I didn't force them to come inside, wash their hands before they ate or anything like that. And as I'm sure we'll get into, I didn't also when they came inside after playing, the sand would stick to their clothes or their shoes, or so I would find clumps of it just sometimes randomly in their bedroom or randomly here or whatever, which again it didn't alarm me, it was more just an annoyance because even with the vacuum, which once you vacuum then goes all over your house, it's still you still see the colour kind of embedded in your carpet fibres. So it hasn't fully been suctioned up on that first go.

Speaker 3 16:50

So, Tim, what are your thoughts on this, Tarianne?

Speaker 6 16:56

Oh, look, I've been looking into asbestos exposure pathways for most of my, if not all of my research career in New Zealand, and I never ever thought that I'd be adding children's play sand as an exposure pathway. Um so it was absolutely gobsmacking when we first saw this. And again, it goes back to a lot of the work that we do at the MSAA Trust, which for those of you who don't know, and you probably do because I say it a lot, but MSAA Trust is New Zealand's only charity dedicated to two things. Firstly, helping people who have asbestos-related disease, and secondly, stopping it from happening in the future. And so, as part of MSAA, we knew we had to get outreach out there, and we also needed to, where we could, provide some reassurance because the event had happened. You can't take it back. What's gone is gone. And although it is frightening, and if I'd been a parent, I would have been frightened. If I'd have been a parent, if my children had used the sand, um they're a bit big for that, and I would have been frightened too. But I think that you know it was an important part for us to be able to communicate, and our responsibility at that time was to make sure that people had somewhere that they could come and talk to us. We couldn't turn around and go, You're perfectly safe. We weren't going to do that because we don't know that, and that wouldn't have been fair. But there were some things we could do, and then that's when we started as well, looking into um experimentation, which we'll talk about later on. But yeah, definitely my I it was again, I knew about the Talcum as you mentioned there, Elle. And I knew about the fire doors as well. Although, again, that's building, really, isn't it? Rather than um rather than anything else. But again, yeah, it it's gobsmacking, really, that this can happen. Yeah, I'm gonna pass on to Rob now.

Speaker 4 18:39

Uh yeah, I think for me personally, uh you know, for for decades now been working in the asbestos field, um uh really with the aim of uh resolving a long-standing issue, which was asbestos in buildings. I mean, we all know around asbestos in buildings, and I I feel that uh we've definitely made uh significant headway after the last decade of removal, reducing that risk. And it was always that we felt really strongly and and positively in the industry that we are moving to a better place in the future so that people are not becoming exposed to it because as we know the disease that results from it uh is pretty horrific. Um, so for me, you know, in the industry that I'm in, that it was very sort of much uh we're getting somewhere, and when this came out for me, it was a real step back because from my perspective is that okay, we've got this contained material, we're managing it, we're monitoring it, we're res resolving and removing it safely. And then on the other hand, we're importing the material with asbestos in it, and our children are playing with it. So, from my perspective, it was a real concern because all the knock-on risks around that are really, you know, for me, not to speak too bluntly, but you know, this is something that we need to eliminate and eradicate completely. The risk is you know, as humans we've developed ourselves to a position whereby we can do without this material now. You know, we are a little bit more involved and advanced, and we don't need that. So to find out it's in children's plays and for me, yeah, again, really devastating to be honest with you, and um something that you know we've taken on board and we want to resolve.

Speaker 7 20:33

It almost felt like though, with some of the other comments that were made, it's like if they discover it but the client didn't ask you to do that, it's like why did you do that? It's almost like people uh, and I'm I don't know because I'm just reading into what I saw, but it's like don't look too closely, don't ask questions. What we don't know is better for our bottom line. And that's scary to me.

Speaker 4 21:02

Yeah, I look I I'll comment on that actually, because um, you know, for me, right's right. I've always been that way, and um, you know, for me seeing something like this, there was never any and an independence of us all in the space that we work. For for us, it was very much that this is wrong, what do we need to do to fix it? And we jumped on and got that done and and Jason and I and and Terry Ann, we often had these types of conversations around you know, that moral right thing to do. But I do understand and appreciate that you know, with labs they see thousands and thousands of products coming through. They don't necessarily know where they originate from. There's loads of overseas testing that goes on for them, so it is a bit more challenging.

Speaker 7 21:50

Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm not I'm not criticizing them at all because there should be a that that could come from the regulator, I believe. Better directive.

Speaker 4 22:02

Yeah, uh the challenge I suppose for everybody as well, as Jason sort of alluded to earlier on, is around the PCBU status. Persons conducting a business or undertaking, which is with our uh um work safe health and safety regulations, is it's all about the workplace, and this one sort of fell between the gaps. This one was actual people's homes or not designated as a workplace, and that's something schools and early childhood scenes. Absolutely. Um but as far as we never expected it to be brought into the country and shared in those environments because for us it was hey, that stuff stopped, we're not importing it anymore, we're not bringing putting it in the building products. But unfortunately we found that it was, and I thought, you know, everybody I've worked with in the industry known about this, uh jumped on board with this. We're all trying to do the best we can, but again, as you say, getting our regulator and everybody else on board uh yeah, it's takes a little bit of work.

Speaker 3 23:03

Yeah, and it was it was mostly Rob that took it forward with Workspace and he worked closely with Workspace, which was fan fantastic. But just going on about the risk. We've got a world marketplace. We can go online, we can order what we want from from any any country. And it's very hard to check what what's coming through the borders. Uh but the companies that are selling these products should take some some responsibility and something should be put in place legally. Where we've we've talked about it before, where products if they are if there's a risk that could be asbestos in the product, then they should be tested.

Speaker 7 23:44

Also, though, in chatting with Terri Ann, you mentioned to me about how you spend a lot of time working on educating people who are young developers or people who are renovating homes on what to look for in that environment. If this is a risk and it's out there, then education is another avenue that could be done. But that does require having difficult conversations and almost kind of bursting the bubble for people. Like these things might not be safe. Here's what to look out for, here's questions to ask or whatever. And but that needs to be a willingness of everybody to sort of do that, right?

Speaker 6 24:20

Yeah, and I look, it's it's hard enough as it is. We've done education programs for students in trade schools, um, and we were quite astonished at the lack of awareness generally. And we thought, well, in a trade school, everyone's gonna know, right? Um, but then you're looking at the general community, and we ran a barbecue. Uh one of the might attends let us host a barbecue, which was fabulous, and it was an awareness barbecue, and we just kept calling people, oh, come over, come and look at this. And I think that they were a little bit nervous because obviously you put the word asbestos up, and people are running the other way, getting out of the car park as quickly as they can. And so, because of it's the fear it it creates when you say the word, and and I know Jace uses the A-word, which I really like, rather than actually saying asbestos, because of that, again, I think people are so frightened of it that sometimes it's actually even quite hard to have the conversation in the first place. Sorry, I just knocked my microphone, then apologies. Um, people uh are quite frightened about it, and so you know, it's actually it's really quite difficult to do an awareness campaign when there's quite a lot of people who I think would rather just go. Um, which again makes it hard. And going back to what you were saying, yeah, that you know, products that are coming in that have been mined like this, I would like to see them checked. You know, they have to be checked essentially. That's what I'd like to see. I I don't know how I know it would be expensive, I know it wouldn't be easy. I understand all of the things that people are saying about one.

Speaker 7 25:49

Kmart makes a pretty good, they make a pretty good, you know, there's there's pretty good margins there, you know.

Speaker 6 25:54

So you don't have to test every single one, but you could do batch testing and you would pick stuff up like this, um, because you know that that was an indicator there, you know. We knew it was being mined, therefore there is a risk. It's not like it was, you know, a soft toy made out of wool, where you know, it's really unlikely. This was something where, you know, it's time to start thinking about where else these products might be coming in.

Testing The Sand And A Positive Result

Speaker 4 26:18

So, on that basis, what were the next steps for you when you sort of discovered it, Elle? Uh, can you tell us a little bit about, you know, the Facebook group and Instagram and TikTok?

Speaker 7 26:30

So I sat on it for a little bit, knowing that it was outside, knowing I'd seen it inside, but I didn't want to react in a way that was like I was overdoing it. But saw on the news the T Rapa store closure. So there was a Kmart store in Hamilton where it was discovered in that one of the record products was discovered in their break room. And the response that the media showed the store took alarmed me because it was in absolute contradiction to the way we were to act. And I understand that there's certain requirements around workplaces, but it was in my home with the most precious souls, you know, in my opinion, on the world. So after seeing them close the store and do a decontamination, um, I was like, okay, I'm gonna have to just bite the bullet and reach out to an asbestos removalist company. I've never contacted one before in my life. And I a hundred percent was bracing myself for them to laugh at me on the phone and say, oh, another crazy came up, mum's calling. But my kids were worth it. So I finally did it. Just went on Google, looked one up, and looked at the reviews of the top results, went with the one that had the most reviews, and thought, okay, surely that's a good place to start. The person answered the call and I started explaining, and I wasn't met with eye rolls or sighs or, oh, you know, like you're overreacting. Somebody was compassionate, somebody was empathetic, somebody understood why I would be confused. They weren't alarmist. They said actually that they had tested some up to that point, and only three had returned back positive. I later found out that those three were probably cross-contamination, like with a type of asbestos that is common in Christchurch. Um, mine was the first to come back with Tremolite that they ended up testing. But anyway, so they said they explained to me what my options were. They said if I wanted to get it tested just for peace of mind, but just be aware it's probably not going to show anything. So that's just money down the drain. I could do it and they could help me with that. They said it would be about $150 for if I bagged, we double bagged it, put it outside. They would come by, take it to an independent lab, and then they would rush it through. So we could kind of have that peace of mind. And I was like, yep, let's do it. And told my husband, I'm sorry, I've agreed to this, but this will be great because we'll feel so much better of it because Kmart's info on the recall notice is just to hit it out the window, basically. And I didn't feel that was comfortable to do that. Well, yeah, that's when things quickly took a turn when we found out that we had that positive result.

Speaker 4 29:31

So from that point there, moving through into Facebook groups and videos, um, how did that go?

Leaving Home And The Fear Afterward

Speaker 7 29:38

Okay, so I got the call explaining what the lab had found, and our class A asbestos removalist was very concerned because at that point in time we didn't have a lot of information to go off of. All that I could tell them was in terms of trying to establish what the risk was for our family. The twins had played with it primarily outside, but I know that I had cleaned it up inside, as I had just you know explained. I know that I had it had been on our clothes, those clothes had gone through the wash. We have an HVAC system in our home. So we were given advice that uh was relevant to us at that time, which was if you have a place you can go, I would get out because we don't know what the risk of the contamination is at this point. And it's best that we stop it here until we can do environmental testing. And so it's a case of don't panic, but let's be careful in our approach not to continue the risk. So we were advised to get out of the house as quickly as we could, close windows, turn off the air circulating that was happening, uh, leave wearing the clothes we have, not taking any toys because, and then they organized and moved things because this was getting very close to Christmas, um, to do they they said they could come back the next day. It was Saturday at 7 a.m. to start the test because they would need to, you know, monitor the air, and that was going to take some time. So, and then the lab as well would need time to process that. So we wouldn't know until Monday. So finding out we had Tremolite and that there was the concern from the lab who phoned this person who then phoned us is that Tremolite isn't the typical kind of garden variety asbestos that they were getting here in Christchurch. And with our children being younger, uh, the type of fibers having that needle-like fibers, they deemed that to be a higher risk that wasn't worth kind of gambling with as well. So we took their advice seriously. We got our twins in the car, and my husband and I went about kind of collecting a few, like we there were their like toilet training. So we had to, they explained to us how to wipe down their plastic porter toilets and stuff to take with us. It was those kinds of things, but we left with no bedding, nothing. And I went on my Instagram and I put up a story on my Instagram as well as on TikTok. And it was filmed very like there was no thought process behind it. It was in the moment. And I just wanted to get the word out because we're being told in these recall notices, oh yeah, this best off, it's low risk. Tremorite doesn't appear anywhere. Um anything. And I felt that there was a big misalignment in the communication that even if you get it out of your house, it's not physically in my house, that doesn't necessarily eliminate the risk. And people deserve to know that, I thought.

Speaker 4 33:14

So, with that hostility, I mean, what what did that look like really? Was it a bit of an unusual response from many parents about your concerns for the products? Tell us a little bit about that.

Speaker 7 33:26

It was it was tough. So with TikTok, I some interesting stuff happened there that this is going to sound conspiracy theorist of me, but you can label content with hashtags, you know, to help people search to find information. And when I tried to add the hashtag Kmart sand recall, sand recall, like something about Kmart and Sand, zero results. It said there were zero pieces of content attached to that. How is that the case? Because it's there. So I was concerned whether or not this information was actually actively being hidden from people. And I don't have anything to support that. That's just me, you know, putting a guess out there, but I found that concerning because then the people that ended up finding my video were, I don't know if they were really people either, because a lot of them that were commenting didn't have a profile picture, had a stock image for a profile picture of like a random cat or something, had a strange name, and bizarre that everybody seemed to have the same message they needed to get across, which was eh, it was either asbestos is in the environment, this person is like crazy, it's not a big deal, or you know, this mum is overreacting, she's crazy. But everybody, it felt like, was desperate to get their hands on this season's, you know, top trend, asbestos, and I knew that it was scattered throughout our backyard. You could have come over and rolled in it if you were so desperate for it. Like, do you want me to blow it in your face and see how you feel? Because my kids were up that close to it. And I was really the thing that discouraged me the most about that was that although I was attempting to keep up with those comments and to be able to counteract them in a way that was like sensible, evidence-based on what I could find online from Work Safe and Z, you know, reputable sources, is that if I was a mum who was looking for information and I read through the comments and I saw these two options of either this person's overreacting, this person, like you know, is telling you it's really dangerous, I want to go with the overreacting because I would rather believe that honestly. And I was concerned that me sharing that video was actually doing like a disservice because it was undermining how serious it was. So I ended up taking the video down from TikTok because I thought it was too confusing. On Instagram, I've I have a um a lovely community there who people who know me uh and know that I'm not the kind of person to just like jump on drama for the sake of it and were concerned for us because we learned that uh what the seriousness could be as a scale, like if it was discovered in the house, and then we needed further testing to determine what that meant. I had no idea that that could mean bye-bye carpet, bye-bye car uh curtains, you know. I was like, oh dear, this is no wonder they want you to throw it out and not get it tested. Yikes.

Speaker 4 37:02

Yeah, no, that's uh that is terrible to hear that that happened. Um I suppose the team, yeah, working in industry, uh is this a typical response? Go to you, Terrian.

Speaker 6 37:15

Yeah, I I actually think it is in my experience. And remember that I I'm not a removalist, um, I'm not an asbestos consultant, um, I'm a researcher. So I I stand a little bit on the periphery. Um, but I do find that I do get lots of people saying, Oh, asbestos is not even a thing, is it? Oh, yeah, no, what are you talking about? What are you worried about? Even my dad, I can remember saying, Why are you doing that? Why don't you use something properly dangerous? That's a real problem. So, you know, so at the end of the day, I think that is a very common response. I think people are scared of it, don't really understand it, and therefore the best thing to do, as I said earlier, is to not think about it. But just to give you um uh a case study that I went to see in Australia, we were really lucky. The ACT government in Australia were really wonderful when they said, come over and see what we're doing with our Mr. Fluffy homes. And for those of you who don't know, Mr. Fluffy Homes was loose for asbestos that was put into the roof cavity, and then over time it started to migrate down through the walls into the living space. And when they went into some of these homes and tested the living space, they found fibres and so said to people, okay, put your put your keys on the table and get out. And those whole houses were, but everything was scooped up and put into asbestos um disposal, and then the houses themselves were sprayed with a mixture of PVA and glue, and basically broken down and sent to hazardous landfill. And so that's how serious they took. Now I know that this is quite different because this we're talking about the big volumes here, um, but again, we are talking about loose fibres, so you know they they took that pretty damn seriously, and this may well be on a much, much smaller scale, but I do understand why your the guy that you contacted, the the group that you contacted look took it seriously and and went and did the right thing and took samples and and actually looked to see all how how far has it gone in this house and um are we finding it anywhere else? Because that's the right thing to do.

Speaker 1 39:13

I don't think that's scaremongering, I think that's just being careful.

Speaker 3 39:19

Yeah, I've seen a mixed reaction to uh the A-word, as we call it, us surveyors and assessors, when we discuss it, we call it ASI. So we'll say there's a bit of ASI over there, or just so we don't mention the word asbestos. Because I find that yes, some people can be dismissive and say, Oh, I've been I've probably eaten lots of asbestos for years and I've worked in the trades, it's it's never really bothered me. And then in other buildings or you know, hospitals or schools you mention the A-word and it just goes boom. Uh and people are like, Oh my god, it's an asbestos and it can be blown out of proportion. Uh but let's not forget it's a carcinogen and it can give you cancer, and especially when when it's when it when it's flyable. So I'd rather people err on the on the side of of oh my god, you know, let's get out until we you know we presume it is a risk until until it's not uh rather than just miss it and say, Oh it's never gonna bother me. So but yeah, people do react differently, definitely.

Speaker 7 40:30

Yeah, when like we got that when I got that call, immediately after I got off the phone, I fell to the ground like sobbing because I handed that to my kids. So that's why I learned that, and then you know, I think it would be fair to say that any parent's worst nightmare would be to outlive your children, like that that would be it. So, and you know with what the potential risk is if you're playing, if you've got asbestos in that product, um, that for me it was, yeah. I mean, I got ridiculed for leaving the house for sure, but there was oh I can't tell you the relief and like the safety I felt knowing that I was taking my children back home once it had been confirmed safe. Like that that peace of mind was what I'd hoped to have gotten from that initial test result, and I I did get it eventually, and I'm so grateful that we were able to go home.

Illegal Imports And Worst-Case Safety

Speaker 2 41:40

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Speaker 4 43:40

Okay. So the first distinction was the legal side of things. And that was the in New Zealand we should not be accepted any material, but it's banned. So there should be no asbestos in it. And I think that was sort of wasn't really picked up as much as it should have been by media and everybody. Because it broke the law. We're not allowed to import materials with asbestos in it in New Zealand. Zero. Full stop. So for me, it was very clear cut. The other side relating to risk as well, I was pretty alarmed by some comments I saw, both that both ends of the extremes in relation to the associated risk. Because, you know, Terry Ann knows uh a lot more than than I in this space. But what I would say is through the research, is you know that undertaking that simulation of play and then doing background modeling hadn't happened at that point. So anybody saying that there was no risk had what basis? We were saying, what basis are you making that judgment on? And it took further scientific testing than it does to determine the actual risk. But with asbestos, we're always taught in our field that you always, without that knowledge, you always go into the worst-case scenario and work your way back. Because you're always safer to do that. So pick it up on your point, Al, exactly how I would have approached it worst-case scenario back. And then and that way, if you find it's not as risky, that's great. But if you find if it is, you've done the right thing. So better safe than sorry is what I'd always say.

Speaker 7 45:20

Thank you. I that better safe than sorry was what I kept reassuring myself. And I thought, how funny we say that as a saying, but here apparently doesn't ring true to people.

Simulating Play To Measure Fiber Release

OIA Emails And Recall Language Control

Speaker 6 45:32

No, look, and they're brilliant points that Rob made, and I and I absolutely concur that I would have done the same. I would have done exactly the same if it had been my family. Um so I think that is what comes from perhaps having some knowledge, but also from that approach where your children are precious. Um, if it costs you a couple of hundred dollars, if you can afford to do it, um then you do it, don't you? You do what you need to do. So one of the things, um this is probably the best place to just mention it, and I'm only gonna mention it briefly because we're gonna talk about it in a future podcast. But after that happened and Rob liaised with some of the um government authorities to talk about what's going to happen next, Jason and I sat to sit down with our pen and paper and started to look at, all right, let's design some experiments. Um, and those experiments will tell us whether or not fibres are being released from both craft sand, which is much drier, and the kinetic sand, which is the one that you use, Dale, that's a lot more moist. Um, and so it's taken it took us all Christmas to actually write the methodology. Um, we're actually running it as we speak, and I tell you, it is extremely hot, tiring work. Um, I'm not allowed in the class A enclosure because I am not a licensed um removalist or an asset, but we have some fabulous volunteers who are doing that, who are licensed, who do have the right qualifications and well protected, and we are actually trying to um simulate the same sort of play activity. So I was delighted to see the photos that you sent because um we spoke to lots of parents about well, what were you using it for, and we had to try and make sure that we were doing similar sorts of activities. But as you said, there's no one activity, there's a whole broad spectrum. So we were again, let's go to work case scenario. Okay, we've heard that children have been throwing it and it ended up in their hair, so we'll do that because at the end of the day, we need to know if those fibers are ending up in the airspace and particularly around their respiratory zone. So those experiments are happening at the moment. We've got some very fantastic um sponsors who are helping us with this, um, and we'll talk a bit more about that later on, but perhaps moving on from um the stories, and we are so, so sorry that happened to you, Elle. It is it is a really unpleasant thing to hear about, and I I would I would have been the same with the tears as well, I can tell you. Um, one of the things that really interests us is that you've submitted some official information requests, and so we'd quite like to know a little bit more about those. Are you happy to share with us what you were hoping to find out and what you how far you've actually got?

Speaker 7 48:02

Yeah, well, I actually felt when I logged on, actually, because I chatted with Rob and Jason um logging on for this podcast, and I mentioned I had a little bit of a fangirl moment because I'd seen I've seen all your names in my documents and I recognized it from the podcast as well. But I thought, ah, funny. Um yes, we did. So my husband and I, we actually met years ago. Both of us were studying law. We both have that legal background, and we just started submitting OA requests, and they are a little bit slow, haven't gotten them all back, um, which is interesting, but have gotten some that work safe, uh, which in MBIE, those were the primary ones that I was most interested to kind of see. And I've shared a little bit about this on my Instagram too, because one of there were there were it's a it's it's a hard one because you need to sort of know all the nuances around the testing and like the terminology. And I, you know, I'm trying to pick it up as I go, uh, to sort of understand how problematic the situation is and how little people are being told of what's really important. Um, so to see the government in the government documents, it referred to as on par worse than the Johnson and Johnson asbestos incident with the telc, and that is one of the biggest lawsuits. That kind of just puts into scale how far this could go, um, I think was like the concern, and to see how involved, how collaborative the process was between MBIE and the Commerce Commission and Kmart and what the recall notice wouldn't wouldn't say and what was held back.

Speaker 6 50:02

What? I didn't know you could do that. That's really interesting because I yeah, I I had no idea either. And and so so you are you suggesting, well, not suggesting that that there was actually you know that that that recall notice was created together. Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 7 50:24

The language was ultimately approved by Kmart. Kmart, and I have all I have all of these that I can I can provide them to you. So I'm not speaking, like I'm not speaking on my own behalf. This is what I've read for myself in email correspondence. Uh Kmart took out messaging around consumer rights. They wanted that off the recall notice. And the government complied. I have no idea why they get to determine what's on and what's not on. And there has been a consistent pattern with what I've seen in the OIA documents versus what's been said publicly. The one party who is directing the conversation is Kmart. It is their communication that is front and center. And they are making it very clear to people that this is a, they're using the term precautionary recall, and uh changed the language from you either have a voluntary recall or a compulsory recall. This looked like, thanks to Rob's meeting with WorkSafe, this was gonna be a compulsory recall. But you were given the heads up, hey, we've found this kind of you know, nudge nudge, do the right thing. And if you do the right thing, um, then they didn't say this obviously, but you know, if if Kmart takes that first step and does the voluntary recall, which they did, they can then say, this was voluntary, this is all just all a precaution, no big deal. They've put in the word, no, there's there's no respirable asbestos found, I think. I don't have the notice right in front of me. But again, where is your evidence to support that? You don't just get to say things, you don't just get to make words up without your source material. I haven't just turned up and shared things without saying this statement, because there's where it comes from. This is what I'm relying on. No one's made them do that, and no one has challenged them in the government. Also, that recall, then unrecall that happened, that added further confusion to it because it was reported like it was all over and it was all a big non-issue.

Speaker 4 52:59

Yeah, so um, no, I'll just say something there, sorry, to about that. Look, you know, understanding a lot of those conversations as well. I think going back to my initial um statement earlier on that it's against the law to import asbestos containing products, that was never covered in any of the recalls. Because regardless of the risk, they moved to the risk argument, fine, uh, though I believe they were wrong, but uh that's my opinion. Um I would also say the law thing wasn't sufficiently covered. If they would have told parents in the it's against the law to import asbestos containing products and being really clear with that, that would have been a much better position to be in. But um I think it's lessons learned, I suppose, in some of those ways. But you know.

Speaker 7 53:54

Well, do you know what I know something else then? We asked specific what what actions are being taken against Kmart because the Commerce Commission has a number of options available to them, and they confirm that they are there's no further investigation, there's no active enforcement against them, there's no like reparation or costs or anything that's being required of them. That shocks me. Because what do you mean that you can just bring in, like you said, an illegal substance, and there is absolutely no consequence for doing so. And yeah, so I I agree. It's either banned or it's not. If the government wants to make this, you know, like say that it's allowed in at a certain degree, then that's different, but it shouldn't have been in here in the first place.

Speaker 6 54:56

No, and just for the record as well, we did I reached out to Kmart personally and said, hey, look, we're doing this study, we're looking to see if the fibers do end up in the air. Um, would you like to comment? Would you like to help? Would you like to be involved? And I never had a response, which I was really disappointed in because this is evidence that's going to be really, really useful. It we really hope that in the long term it's reassuring. We hope that there are no fibres. It would be brilliant, wouldn't it, if we can come in? Oh, yeah. Yeah. That's that's our intent. Now that might not be the case, and if it isn't the case, and we we can't say that, at least we have a record of the fact that that exposure has happened, and that exposure could have generated fibers in there, whichever way it goes, and we don't know at this stage, and we don't have enough results to be able to comment on it. Um, but that will then help us because again, with um you know, covering you in New Zealand, getting funding to cover your treatment, should that happen, should the worst happen? And I am talking about, you know, the worst case scenario here. Um, sometimes it's quite difficult to get evidence to find out where you're exposed and prove exposure. That can be quite challenging. Um it's something that we see a lot with some of the um mesothelioma patients that we have in our charity. We we see quite some some long battles with people trying to prove that they're exposed when actually they don't know because the exposure is accidental. Nobody wants to or chooses to get exposed to asbestos, so it can be quite tricky. So that that was our reasoning behind doing it, but we haven't we haven't really had any particular support or buy-in, which I think is a shame because there's a there was an opportunity there. Um anyway, I I've got to ask you this question, although, you know, and and and this is your opinion, so you can answer it however you'd like to. But generally, I laugh as I say this. How do you feel about the way the issue was handled in New Zealand? Can you say anything positive that's been done well? Um, is there anything that you can think that can be improved on? But how do you feel it's been handled?

Speaker 7 57:05

It's out there now, right? So I hope that people who may have been affected and were curious about that felt at least empowered to have further investigations and look into it rather than being gaslit, like there's nothing to see here, you're crazy. Um, I hope that they found some support in investigating further. Um and we also, I mean, we make mistakes as humans constantly, right? That's how society just continues to get better, is by not just repeating it again and again and again. Um, so I hope that this can only get better from here and we can improve it for future generations. That's why I chose to speak out that hopefully this won't be an issue going forward. Um, but other than that, that's probably where my positive thoughts kind of and and uh you know it does also kind of give you faith in humanity again when you meet other people who um like I appreciate this conversation because these are this is not something you want to talk about for you know any with anybody. Um and I understand it can be hard to sort of grapple with that, even though the risk is low and we all, you know, no one wishes harm on any child or any person, but um sometimes you have to have those hard convos too.

How The Problem Spreads Worldwide

Speaker 6 58:35

Yeah. And look, I think you're incredibly brave to have done that in the first place, to go on TikTok, to put yourself out there, to go on Instagram and actually talk about this, because the problem is that it is a frightening thing to talk about, and so it does sometimes cause people to have those sorts of reactions. So I think actually for for sharing your experience and and giving some sort of hope and hopefully some reassurance to other people, I think is really important. So well done for doing that. Um, I do have um one last thing I'm gonna I'm gonna pass over to Rob for this one because elsewhere in the world with asbestos sand, we know that you've been working with lots and lots of different countries um who have discovered the sand. Can you tell us anything about the approach elsewhere? Is there anything that you can share with us about that, Rob?

Speaker 4 59:23

Absolutely. Um it's funny, I had a few uh obviously uh media outlets speaking to me. I spoke to media outlets ABC over in Australia when it first kicked off. However, but uh if we go further afield to Europe, so I worked with an investigative reporter there, uh Richard Cleavers from Denmark. And um even though we had a bit of a language barrier, we worked diligently for many, many evenings and uh obviously part of the European Union. And uh I worked through some of the testing that he'd had commissioned and we worked through the results and what that looks like uh for him. And with the tests that he had done, he picked similar products that we had seen, but they look very similar with different names on them, but they were clearly from very similar places, and um because he targeted that uh 50% of his original samples all come back positive. So he raised a flag to several other member states across Europe and um you know some words from him, he was a little bit shocked that the European Union didn't trigger. There's meant to be a European Union trigger where something like that happens and all member states are informed. But he was getting crickets really, he was getting no real response, so took it upon himself to then obviously talk to neighbouring countries and then talk to other investigative reporters, and and that's actually what got it out, and it snowballed right across Europe. I also spoke to colleagues I know over in the UK and give them a heads up of what's happening and what potentially is coming for them. But um, I think the biggest takeaway from it for me personally was that without investigative reporters, I don't think we would have got the the reach that we we've we've got, and I'm really pleased with the reach that we've got. This is an international product, it's being sold all over the world, and we know that. So, you know, it's a bit disappointing that the European Union didn't pick up in it quicker than they could have done, uh, and then let all their member states know. However, it just shows that the power of people caring really makes a difference. So that's something I've taken away from it, is that there are people out there that really do care and are really willing to put their uh you know on the line proverbially and and actually go out and say what's right. So I think for me personally, um I have to say it it really makes me realise that there are good people out there and uh we can always rely on that really to help us through these situations. But the big machine of government is is a hard knot to crack, unfortunately.

Speaker 6 1:02:15

So I I've just got one more comment and then I'm gonna pass over to Jason and it'll be that from me. Um we did talk before we started the podcast on how many countries have been impacted, and we we haven't got an exact number, we know it's over 20, and most recently we've had Malta and Canada. So um the list is growing. Um my question is actually for Jason. So, Jason, from your perspective, um what could we do better next time? Or what could we have done better this time? In terms of our response really to the whole situation. And Robbie's right, I do think that we've had some really great media support. And because I did a few interviews at the time in New Zealand, what I really liked about that is that when I said to them, look, I would like to provide some reassurance, they really didn't push me into the corner and and try and make it um you know, so that people were hysterical about it. They they really worked with me on that, and I really appreciated that. I thought actually the way they did that was that they were happy to try and go down that reassuring track, and I thought that was actually brilliant because there were lots of scared people out there. So, Jason, over to you. What could we have done better?

Speaker 1 1:03:26

We got caught on the hop, basically.

Speaker 3 1:03:30

Uh we weren't expecting it. We had the fire doors that had I suppose it was contamination, and then we had uh the sand. I would have done the same as you well. I would have got my kids out there straight away and got it cleaned up uh as soon as possible. Uh absolutely I think it's more for the future. So going forward, these items do need to be tested. They should have been tested previously, like you said. Quite a lot of these items that are coming into New Zealand uh could contain asbestos, but they're not being tested. And they're still available, which really, really saddens me. So we'll so we talk about Kmart. Kmart are a supplier, but they're not the only supplier. There's a warehouse. My wife went to a a market just you know we were selling small goods, and there was a table full of coloured sand, and she contacted me and she says, Are they allowed to sell this covenants to coloured sand? Because it's got asbestos in it, Auntie. And I I was gonna smell because it's still available, like so just to clarify there isn't asbestos in all coloured sand, but it has the potential coloured sand has the potential to col to contain asbestos. So as a parent, I would not allow my children to play with coloured sand. So I think more should be done by the government. All they do is focus on buildings, uh, which is getting better and better, uh, but they do need to focus on the items that are coming to the country, which is difficult, especially with the worldwide market, uh, with with the with the T-Mu, the Sheens, and there's a lot of products coming in that cannot be checked. Uh the customs can't check it all. But they should have a list of what items could potentially contain asbestos and then one parents, so then they can decide whether to buy them or not.

Speaker 4 1:05:36

Further to that, Jason, and you made some really good points there. One key thing I would like to see uh more than anything other than the additional tested at the border, which would be good, uh, but uh a little bit more collaboration in relation to mandating all labs released their results. Okay, because you know, a lot of the labs were unable to release. Lease results, but it's within the government's power to say, I want to see all coloured sand results tested, and that way you'd have a a really um good list and understanding of what products are. That didn't happen, and I would like to see that happen. Our colleagues over in Australia were far more active in that space to get results released from labs.

Speaker 1 1:06:27

But I would like to see more of that in New Zealand.

Speaker 6 1:06:33

And I know I said it was my last comment, but I would like to see actually some support. We as I said, we do have a couple of good government-based funders, so I know and they've been fabulous, don't get me wrong, but there's so much that we need to know and so much that you can put into doing a decent risk assessment that we haven't been able to do because we simply don't have the funds. And it shouldn't really be that volunteers are out there doing this work and doing a lot of work in this space because nobody else is doing it. You know, I I really feel and that that might be an international thing, you know, that might be a collaborative thing where lots of governments get together and say, Well, we will fund a study, and that study might be replicated in a couple of different countries. But it's important to know what the risks are, and that really, really hasn't happened. So there's our study, and there's one in the UK as well that's taking place. Um, but it's been very tricky trying to get enough funding to actually cover the costs. That's been really hard for us. So much so that we actually released a give a little to try and cover some of the uh analytical costs. Um, we released it a few months ago, and I think we've got $300, which isn't going to go very far. But that's partly because marketing is not my baby. But who knows? Maybe it will go further later.

Speaker 3 1:07:46

Well, I'll put a link on this podcast where people can uh give to the cause so we can do more testing going forward. Uh all the testing we can get the get it tested in the labs in America. So, Elle, so you no longer practice as a lawyer, but without giving legal advice, can you tell us a bit more about the Consumer Guarantee Act?

Speaker 7 1:08:12

When all of this happened, and as those costs were starting to increase, you know, each step of the way, you've got the lab test, you've now got the environmental test, you've got this, you've got that. I felt quite secure in the fact because I know how the Consumer Guarantees Act clicks into gear in this situation. So it in my mind it wasn't my tab to pick up, it's Kmart's tab to pick up. And that's because the Consumer Guarantees Act is quite like a remarkable piece of legislation that requires goods and services that you purchase in New Zealand to meet certain standards, essentially. And being safe is one of those standards. The way in which the Consumer Guarantees Act sort of works, I sort of think of it as like a pathway. It's like you start at the top and you think, okay, is there an issue where one of those guarantees isn't being met? If you go, yes, then okay, we've got an issue, the Consumer Guarantees Act applies. If there isn't an issue, then it obviously doesn't apply. Once you've established that there is a problem, the next thing to determine on which pathway you take is is it a minor thing that's wrong, or is it a substantial thing that's wrong? This is quite a crucial part of the Consumer Guarantees Act because if you establish that it's something minor, it defaults to the supplier or the retailer to choose what remedy they provide you with. Whereas if it's substantial, it's the consumer's right to choose what remedy they opt for. And refund only really sits in that camp unless a supplier or a retailer is just like, oh, this is too hard, I'll just refund you, you know, which you can totally do by agreement. Well, I was thinking as all this was happening, as Rob said many times in this podcast, it's banned. Easy peasy slam dunk. This is not safe because you can't have it here. So there is no way that you can tell me that this is safe. Wow. The surprises just keep coming because that's exactly what Kmart's doing. That is exactly what they are telling people. Low risk, you know, it went from importantly, no respirable fibers have been detected in the recall notice to, you know, there is low risk, and low risk now equals no risk. So this product, they literally, I've quoted them in my videos. I'm sorry, I can't keep a straight face because it almost feels like it, it's it's a joke. I don't know how you look someone dead in the eyes and say this, but they're saying, although your product may have contained traces of asbestos, the Consumer Guarantees Act doesn't apply because the product is safe. And all of this was just a big precautionary exercise. And people who don't understand that's not the case are walking away going, oh my God, all right. The Consumer Guarantees Act doesn't apply here. And these are people who have ripped out their carpet because of, you know, advice they've been given from experts who who know their particular circumstances. That's what the Consumer Guarantees Act is designed to do. It's not a blanket, you know, thing. It's if somebody's washing machine, you know, leaks, I don't know if that's leaked and it's in a contained area, I don't know if it's leaked and it's just gone everywhere. That's why you have to take every single case as an individual one, you know. But Kmart is, in my mind, working very hard just to knock all these claims out of the park wherever they can. So, because the Consumer Guarantees Act, not only are you entitled to one of those remedies, you know, you hear the repair, replace, refund, you're also entitled to something known as consequential loss. And that is a length of string, you know. I have all of those things that I can directly show are a result of Kmart's failure to provide me, consumer, with these a safe product. And that is a big problem for them because um me times however many people, I know from my OIA information that my particular tub of sand over the last five years, something like not quite 8,000 were sold. Oh wow. Like, you know, yikes. I mean, that's gonna be that could be a big bill. But again, that's not my problem. That's that's the supplier's problem, if that's the case.

Speaker 3 1:13:13

Yeah, it seems very, very dismissive. Um, do you think people in New Zealand are aware of the consumer rights thing?

Disputes Tribunal And Preserving Evidence

Speaker 7 1:13:22

I think it's a it's just a perfect storm in that all this unfortunately happened around Christmas time. It was a busy time for families anyway. We're all overwhelmed with the cost of living, we've got a lot on our mind, you know. Um, a lot of people have young kids or kids, like, you know, this is the last thing we need to really be thinking about. And then on top of that, if you've got a the language out there saying low risk, no risk, already you're gaslighting yourself, nothing to see here. I should just forget the whole thing. And then when you do take it a step further and talk to Kmart, they say, eh, doesn't apply. What do you do? Like, how do you come back to that? Well, the letter that my husband and I submitted to Kmart, they never replied to. And I purposefully, in drafting that letter, my entire aim was to not waste any time on these ridiculous points like the product is safe or this or that. Like, those are just like distraction techniques from the real issue at play here. You sold an unsafe product, it has asbestos. Now you need to fix this problem. You know, here are my costs, here's how they're associated. And they've just ignored me. Great. Like that gives me a lot of confidence because, hey, if we can have an honest conversation and you have things that you can rely on to support your point, maybe I'm wrong. Show me I'm wrong. If if your response is to run to the hills and not engage with me, like what do you have to hide? You know, like let's just figure this out. If this is a big misunderstanding, let's figure this out. Um, so in that case, for anybody who's had that and been dismissed by a retailer, supplier, you can make a claim to the disputes tribunal, which I think can sound a little bit overwhelming, but it's really pretty straightforward in that you don't need lawyers. Um, well, actually, lawyers can't appear, so you don't send a lawyer, and um the person who hears it is known as an independent adjudicator, so it's not a judge, and you essentially just kind of explain what happened, and you don't need to know the law or how it applies, essentially, because they can fill in the gaps for you. Um, but that's where we've had got our dates set down, and that's where next we'll be heading. So the shame is that there is a gap, unfortunately, with um the disputes tribunal was a $30,000 cap on a claim. So even if your losses had bull, you know, snowballed out of that, you could just say, Oh, I'll claim $30,000 and recoup what I can. In January, that got bumped to $60,000. Um, but as I mentioned, if somebody is looking at their carpets, their curtains, their soft furnishings, their clothes, you know, it could quickly go past that. And and all of this being a right for consumers in my case was confirmed in the paper that was released by Professor Ian Shaw and Alex Sims, um, who spoke about, you know, there's a toxicologist and a lawyer who got together and a legal expert, uh commercial lawyer, and talked about the Consumer Guarantees Act being the pathway for consumers to take. And also the Commerce Commission submitted a paper to the officer, Office of Um Parliament, explaining that this is how it'll be mopped up essentially. But that was like an internal briefing document, whereas no one's appeared publicly to tell consumers, like, hey, hey, hey, if you've been affected, here's what you can do without naming the supplier involved. Um, so there's no support, they're just kind of left like out to out to try and figure it out themselves.

Speaker 3 1:17:28

Yeah, so it's like the suppliers are trying to ignore the problem and hope and it goes away, basically.

Speaker 7 1:17:35

Which isn't surprising, right? Because I wouldn't want to pay either. Like I want my I when I go to work, like I don't want to pay excessive amounts of tax or whatever it is. You know, like fair enough. Like I I understand that as a thing, but also too bad. Like that's why you as a business get insurance, and that's why you as a business create robust contracts where you're getting this product from. So my action is against Kmart. Whatever action Kmart wants to take to recoup their costs, like, you know, do your thing, like, you know, go after it. But none of that is is our problem. It's it's just so disappointing because we elect our government and we, you know, I I I should speak for myself. I put my trust in the government and had this almost like ignorance that thinking that they cared about children and their safety and the fact that this has like directly impacted a lot of kids that would be taken a bit more seriously. Um, but I'm sure that there is some difficulty there, which I didn't see this in my documents, so I'm not speaking to it from that point, but I can only imagine the amount of GST that they pay to the government. You know, they're a huge, huge retailer. And I would hate to think that that has any sway in how anything is dealt with, because uh to me it's a right versus wrong issue and something that we can get ahead of and improve on for the future. But I think there's all kinds of complexities we're just not aware of behind the scenes.

Speaker 3 1:19:16

Do you think there's a potential for parents that have been affected that have had to pay up quite a lot of money to for remediation to get together for a law case and maybe do it as one rather than doing it individually?

Speaker 7 1:19:29

Do you know that was actually one of the most surprising attacks that I got from my TikTok, and I've still got it to this day is you are out for the money. I'm like, excuse me? Do you know how it works? Number one, I worked in litigation. I would first of all, I don't know how many lawyers you would meet who would encourage you to pursue litigation. You know, it's no, no, not even the lawyers who do it want to be there. The only people who benefit are the lawyers who charge in six-minute units, you know, it's expensive. And New Zealand, we have the Consumer Guarantees Act. We're not like a litigious like class action country. You you could do it, but yikes, how expensive is that? And who's gonna fund that? You know, we're already shopping at Kmart to save a dollar. Now you want us to fund this with no guarantee? Because Kmart's pockets are way deeper than ours. So, yeah, I mean, you could, and people could, and if they choose to and they have the resources and the means and the energy, because there's all kinds of things outside of the court which delays, you know, you go through various stages before you get to court. And I remember as a junior lawyer working in a stage called discovery when you get the dump of documents from the other side and you've got to go through that. You know, all of that is time and money. I guess AI might exist now to make that faster, but that was just me doing it, you know, with another junior. So yeah, it's a it's a lose-lose, really.

Speaker 1:21:14

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Speaker 3 1:22:16

Anything from the team? Have you got any more thoughts? Rob.

Speaker 4 1:22:21

No, I just think you really summed up really well, Al, that you know, a pathway forward for people. Because there's lots of people that we've seen on Facebook groups, thousands of affected parents in your exact same position. And I think that spreading that knowledge around is just so great because as you experience yourself, as you said, you know, people are quite dismissive, and I think having the next step and how to go forwards and explaining that to people is is vital. So, yeah, for me, just a big thanks for being able to express that in a way that even I could understand, which is great.

Speaker 7 1:23:00

Thank you. I should have said actually, as well, if you are somebody who's found this podcast, you're not from New Zealand, or it's still sort of emerging in your country, and you're like, oh, what do I do? I think if there is something that is just in your gut, um, get advice on how to get it tested at like an accredited lab, some independent source, and hold on to that result because showing that link of where it came from is vital and being able to then pursue remedies later down the track. Because if you unfortunately in New Zealand, if you had thrown it out, and this isn't legal advice, this is just me making guesses based on what I've seen from Kmart when you have a direct link and can directly show it came from their product and they're already denying it did, that you have rights, sorry, is that if you threw it out and you never got it tested, and then you later discover that in your house or have issues, um, I think it would be extremely difficult to convince them that they were the source of that.

Speaker 3 1:24:08

What about yourself, Tony Ann? Have you got anything to add?

What New Zealand Must Change Next

Speaker 6 1:24:12

I think it goes back to one of the most frustrating things about, well, I suppose actually it's a good thing in some ways, but it's also a frustration is the whole latency period whereby, you know, by the time anything happens, could be five years, could be twenty, could never happen at all. Let's hope it does. Let's hope there's no impact at all. But it makes it extremely difficult and challenging to get people off the sofa to do anything about it, to my mind, because you know, it might not happen, and if it does, well, I probably won't know about it, and that makes it so, so difficult to deal with. And um, I hope this isn't uh inappropriate time to mention this. Jason will do a lovely edit if it is. But we lost a wonderful, wonderful, incredible person, Leonie Metcalf, who was the vice chair of MSAA Trust. She was New Zealand's longest surviving mesothelioma patient, and she fought long and hard to raise awareness. She was a nurse and she was exposed in her workplace as a nurse, as was her sister. They both passed away. And she fought really hard. And the one thing she wanted to do was raise awareness and stop more people being exposed. Um, and I think that what we can do is just continue to do that, is to continue to share stories, advice, and help, continue to do it in a calm way, because not every exposure is going to lead to something terrible happening, but we can stop those exposures happening, and we will continue to have these conversations. Some of them are quite difficult at times, but we will continue to do that. Um, so yeah, so thank you for your legacy, Leone.

Speaker 1 1:25:50

All right, so as we start to wrap up the podcast, um a few more things for you, El.

Speaker 4 1:25:57

Um what would you really like to see happen next to improve the situation?

Speaker 7 1:26:06

I would I would love, I'm super I shouldn't be so excited. I'm just I'm excited for the um information that Terri Ann's working on because look, knowledge is power, and however it goes, I mean, I was operating on the information I had at the time. So that's why I took the steps I did. If I had different information, I might have acted differently, right? So um, yeah, I think the more we know, the more we can do to front foot it, essentially. And hopefully there can be um something kind of more definitive given rather than because right now you have the likes of, oh gosh, it's so hard, isn't it? Because you're trying to piece together all these bits, then everything is conflicting information. You've got the way WorkSafe responds, but WorkSafe can't get involved because this is a consumer thing. You've got, I found out through Ministry of Education, their current estimated, their bill right now from schools that they have is three and a half million dollars. And that is what the taxpayers are paying to clean up the Kmart sand. Not Kmart. Ministry of Education have confirmed that Kmart has not been approached, they have not been required to pay that out. I'm sorry. Yeah. And I'm not meaning to get political, but that's just not fair, is it, in my mind. Um so you yeah, but they at least, because they're part of the government, they have schools have some way to try to claim back some costs and be reimbursed for those. Consumers, we really are looking to the Commerce Commission who have been tight lipped. I mean, that they have you know. Media have have approached for comment and they have not responded. And again, like I'm not here to attack them. It's a difficult job to front up when something like this happens because somebody is going to have to admit, you know, like, whoops, like this shouldn't have gotten into the country. It did. But it's I feel like it's just honorable to kind of own mistakes, because that's human, and then give commitments that you're working towards not repeating them. So that's what I'd love to see is like government response that sort of shows us that we can trust that.

Speaker 4 1:28:38

So what would really give you confidence that this has been properly addressed, though?

Speaker 7 1:28:46

Transparency. You know, like isn't they say like sunlight is the best? Like there are things that are mentioned in my documents that were not included, like attachments and things. And I I understand that there are limitations around what is shown and why. But if you really can say that there's nothing to see here, there's, you know, whatever, then have an honest conversation with consumers about that and why, and assure them why. Don't just direct them to the Ministry of Health website, which says that, you know, you should contact a removalist if you have concerns or it's, you know, out of control, or you should wear PPE. Well, why wear PPE? But it's like spread all throughout my living room, you know? It's this is a particular, and they know this too, because this doesn't fit neatly into a category, but I mean, the resources available to them, you guys are the resources. Like they could have come to you and said, you know, what do we do in this case, and at least put that out there, whack up a website with their advice and say, check it for updates, we'll be updating it as more information comes to light. But that would be really nice to kind of direct consumers and make it easy for them to get all of that information, you know?

Speaker 4 1:30:18

It's really the ideal world and the real situation to to be in, I suppose. Um really thrown out from our side to the team. Are there any other key um changes or actions that we really think we need to do as a country? Go to you, Terry Ann.

Speaker 6 1:30:38

Oh, I'm not sure you should have come to me first. Where's my list? Okay. Uh one of the things that I and and we've spoken about this as a team. So Rob Jason and I have spoken about this a lot. But you know, in other countries, this joined up approach to asbestos that you see, whereby you've got a group of experts who are passionate about this, who are able to give advice and it's clear advice, and it comes from one source, and it's science-based evidence, would be really, really helpful. But for that to exist, there needs to be some financial support. Um, we have basically one very, very small volunteer-led charity, and we rely heavily on funds to do anything at all. There's nothing outside of that. If you take Australia as a case study, they have multiple charities. Last time I counted, I think they're around eight. Plus, they're incredible. I'm going to get this wrong, so you might have to help me. Asbestos and Silica Safety and Eradication Agency, was that right? I get that right. Um, they are incredible and they do incredible stuff. And they they are the voice that collects information and is able to connect up to governments and to all sorts of other groups. And I feel that we need one of those two. And we've been talking about this for a long time. Um, it doesn't have to be massive, it doesn't have to be stupidly expensive either, but it just would mean that there's somewhere to go. There's somewhere to go for advice. And the advice comes from people who, let's face it, Rob and Jason be doing it a lot longer than me. I mean, look at them both. Um, but it does come from someone you know who've got the experience, and that experience should be widespread from the consultant side, from the science side, from a whole different set of aspects that are important in this space. Um, and I would like to see that in the future. I don't hold out an enormous amount of hope, but I think that that would be really, really helpful. And that advice then can come through, and yeah, people could contact the public in an event like this, which was, you know, really unexpected. Let's face it, it flawed everybody. So I'm not surprised that everybody's response was like, Oh my goodness, what do I do now? That's absolutely fair. Um but somewhere to go where you can get a good, measured, sensible response that's evidence-based would be really useful and powerful.

Speaker 1 1:32:58

Jason?

Speaker 3 1:33:01

So we talked about work safe, they cover the workplace, so there's definitely a gap there. Um parents want information, people want information about the sand or any of the products which could potentially contain asbestos, and there should be an asbestos advisory board, and all three of us have discussed this and not just covering the workplace but cover any asbestos scenario that collates all the different sectors across New Zealand. So if there's an asbestos issue, then uh this the advisory board can help advise. Now there's nothing there at the moment, there's just work safe that are advising on uh domestic properties with the sand. I know the sand's been used in workplaces, so like the kindies and some of the some of the schools as well. Uh but it's not really their their job domestically because it's not workplace. But going forward, and as a parent, I would not be buying the sand. The sand is available. Does all sand contain asbestos? It doesn't, but there is potential, there is a risk there, and as a parent, I would not. I would not take that risk for my children, especially young children.

Speaker 7 1:34:19

So, about the I'm curious what your thoughts are about the testing. Because there on the Facebook group, there are people commenting and asking, you know, oh, have you reached out to this brand and asked, do you test for asbestos? And the response that they share back will be like, Yeah, we check, and no, we're all clear. But I'm wondering, is it true to say you would want to establish, is it independent testing or are they doing their own and what is their methodology? Because that doesn't necessarily show everything, right?

Speaker 3 1:34:56

Yeah, there's different accreditations and there's only there's only a couple of labs in New Zealand that can actually test for for Tremolite. Uh otherwise they've got to report it differently. Uh especially consultancies that do have the labs, but there's also independent labs as well. So if you are worried that you've not got the independence, then you don't necessarily have to get the sand tested by the consultant that took the took the sample.

Speaker 7 1:35:26

Oh no, I mean sorry, the brand themselves. Like if they're doing their own in-house testing of their products, you know?

Speaker 3 1:35:34

Like suppliers.

Speaker 7 1:35:35

Yeah, sorry, suppliers, yeah.

Speaker 3 1:35:37

I'd like to see some impartiality there. I'd like to see some evidence that they have been tested correctly. Uh so there's two different types of testing. So there's the PLM, polarized light microscopy, which is like times times 400, which is what we do in New Zealand. Uh sometimes it may give a negative result, so then you can send it abroad to America, uh, to Europe or to Australia and get it tested under electron microscopy, which is for example 10,000. So it gives you a deeper analysis. So while it might come out negative in the labs over in uh in New Zealand, when you send it abroad, then you'll get a more accurate result. Yeah. Have you got anything to add on that, Role?

Speaker 4 1:36:28

Yeah, I I suppose the just going back. I mean, the testing was a real challenge for a lot of people to understand that we generally only test for three types of asbestos in New Zealand. So tend uh dependent on your accreditation and what you're accredited under. So there is some differences there, and that's what we found across Europe as well, is that the the method of testing, and that's why a lot of testing's been done in Europe using TEM. Um and and the reason they do that really as a different type of testing is that it will capture all types of asbestos and far more accurately if testing's done correctly. But um, but that being said, I mean, going back to that other point that we were also talking around around some type of sort of um overarching umbrella type organisation that would stitch together all the government organisations. I think for me, that by far is the most important thing that we can do in New Zealand now. Uh, and I will share that we have shared that advice with our Minister for Health and Safety. Um, and you know she probably gets lots of advice about lots of different things, but from us, from an asbestos perspective, it just makes sense because there's so many gaps at the moment. We talk about workspaces, but there's all these other gaps where it can sort of exist. Pre-existing asbestos on land that somebody owns privately that may be a risk, you know. There's all these different agencies that need to sort of work together to be able to combat those types of risks, and this being one of them, for example, if you had um, as you as you said, you know, stand in the back garden, well, what risk does that pose, and how do you deal with that? Does that pose risks to your neighbours, etc. etc.? So all these questions need to have answers to it, and it's really difficult when we've got a fractured um system when it comes to our government system, so there's nowhere to just tie those ends together, and that's what we've sort of been advocating for as well, as Jason said. So I think for me, something like that would be an ideal world. We've seen it with a SEA, as um Terry Ann suggested in Australia. It works, it really works, it ties all those agencies together, everybody's rowing in the same direction as I always like to say, and that's really all we we we could ask for. And for an ideal world, that would definitely be it for me, because these things would be far less frequent and a thing of the past if we could join the dots, I suppose, in some ways.

Final Takeaways And Contact Details

Speaker 6 1:39:05

Can I just actually just add one other thing as well? And that look, it's really important we do discuss children because it's the children that have been playing it, playing with the sand. But there is something else to consider, and that is that outside of the asbestos industry itself and outside of the trades, the next highest risk group are teachers. And so I really do excuse me, I really do feel that this work is important, obviously, for parents with children, absolutely, but also for our teachers, for our teaching assistants, for our cleaners, and for all the people that have come into contact with that sand. And as you said, Earl, you were quite right. Look, if if somebody out there has done some testing and that's why they've said it's no risk, then brilliant. I want to say that. I want to say that. I mean, we would all breathe a sigh of relief, we'd all be sleeping better at night, wouldn't we? Yeah. So please come forward and show us that information because that would be amazing. This isn't a challenge, this is a wish. Um but if there isn't any there, then actually we owe it to all of those groups to get a better understanding. And again, I hope that we come back and we can say something completely reassuring. Um but if we can't, then at least we can come back with some actual evidence, and that might help us in terms of how important it is to manage materials coming on in to New Zealand in the future. So, look, thank you so, so much for your time today, Elle. It's been an absolute pleasure talking to you. You've told us about the Consumer Guarantee Act, which is something I really had no idea about. You've given so much information out there to so many listeners. I think you've been incredibly brave as well to talk about your story, and I'm sorry to hear about the backlash. Um, but we are so grateful that you came and spoke with us today. Um, we are, as always, looking out for new guests and stories about asbestos or any other environmental issues. It doesn't have to be asbestos. So please, if you're interested, connect with the Asbestos Still Kills podcast team at asbestos still kills. It's all one word at gmail.com.

Speaker 7 1:41:12

That's what I did. I sent in I sent in an email. So thank you so much for having me on. It's been just it's been lovely to meet you all. And yeah, thank you.

Speaker 3 1:41:25

Thank you. So finally, uh, thank you so much for joining us today on the asbestos still kills podcast. Thank you to Elle. You've been an absolute wonderful guest, and we look forward to seeing everybody on the next episode.

Speaker 6 1:41:41

Thanks so much. See you later.

Speaker 3 1:41:43

See you later.

Speaker 6 1:41:44

Bye.

Speaker 3 1:41:48

The Asbestos Still Kills Podcast. All right reserved. Thank you for listening to the Asbestos Still Kills Podcast. Presented by Robert McAllister, Family's Director, Dr Terry Amber, the Environmental Innovation Centre, EIT, Jesse Loma, Asbestos Management Consultants Limited, AMT. For more information on the Asbestus Stillkills podcast, go to www.asbestusstillkills.com For more information also to read and accept the podcast disclaimer before viewing or listening to this podcast, go to www.asbestusstillkills.com or contact us by email at aspectusstillkills at gmail.com For more information on the Meteor Teoma support and asbestos awareness trust please go to www.msatrust.org.nz Thank you.