Tuesday marked the second last day of the Royal Commission inquiry into the 2010 disaster which left 29 miners dead.

New Zealand Council of Trade Unions lawyer Ross Wilson was the first to deliver his submission yesterday, as part of phase four into the inquiry which will determine whether extra regulation is needed in the country’s mining sector.

The CTU represents more than 350,000 workers.

Wilson said the Pike River disaster was a “tragedy which should never have occurred” and in response to it suggested the need for new legislation.

“The CTU also submits that this Commission should recommend that the government consider the introduction of a criminal offence of corporate manslaughter into New Zealand law,” he said.

The legislation has been used in the UK since 2006, and Wilson said New Zealand needed to implement the law.

He said the act would make employers responsible at a corporate level.

“This submission is not about victimising or unduly penalising, it’s about bringing home to employers at a corporate level that there is a major responsibility which they have and that might result in some leadership being generated at a board level and at a senior management level,” he said.

Wilson agreed with earlier recommendations that in the case of the New Zealand Department of Labour, it saw merit in it aligning its regulations with Australian jurisdictions.

Wilson said ultimately there was a strong argument that the Department of Labour had forfeited its right to be the mining regulator.

Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union lawyer Nigel Hampton, who has been present throughout the inquiry’s previous phases, said in his submission he had two main issues he wanted to address.

The first was that “Pike River failed abysmally to protect its workers underground”

“Secondly in the union’s submission it is apparent that the Department of Labour as the regulator allowed this situation to build and to occur,” Hampton said.

“The department’s position resulted in the catastrophic consequences and the loss of 29 men.”

Hampton said the “ineptitude” of the DOL led to the EPMU strongly recommending the future health and safety functions of the department be removed and replaced with a separate entity.

In addition to this recommendation, Hampton informed the inquiry that the EPMU was strongly advocating the return of check inspectors.

Hampton said in 2008 the union had called for the return of check inspectors, however the DOL chose not to implement the suggestion.

“With respect of the families at the back, that if in ’08 check inspectors had been adopted, we would've been looking, I suggest, at a very different scenario in Pike River and I regret, the union regrets, that you have been the persons to have suffered as a consequence,” Hampton said.

He expresses his confusion as to why Solid Energy was resistant to bringing back check inspectors.

“What evidence is there that there is a system that is better than, that is safer than check inspectors,” he asked.

Hampton said the system had been implemented in many countries and was an integral part of the New South Wales and Queensland systems.

Lawyers representing the families of the victims also made final submissions.

Lawyer Nicholas Davidson said the New Zealand mining industry had deteriorated some years ago when law changes saw the country abolish the effective regulator.

“By doing so it allowed this company but it could have been another, to fail on so many fronts without the fundamental protections all workers deserve,” he said.

Davidson said the Pike River tragedy was a result of “deep-seated” failures across three levels, referring to the regulator, the worker participation and Pike River Coal.

“In essence the submission is that this mine caught a disaster on many fronts and the evolution of its problems can be traced from the very start,” he said.

While rebuilding an effective system was an enormous task, Davidson said it was a task of great urgency.

Davidson also said the families felt a sense of injustice because Pike River Coal had never admitted to health and safety failures at the mine.

“They are bewildered and have a sense of injustice that for what seems such obvious defaults within Pike River … there seems to be no recognition,” he said.

Davidson said the families were angry that little progress had been made on recovery of the 29 miners since the police handed over control to its receiver in January 2011.

“A moment’s reflection will tell you the angst of these families, nearly all of them, as to the fact they have had no umbrella support for recovery of the men at all,” he said.

Davidson said the only bright light in recent times has been the announcement of the conditional sale of Pike River to Solid Energy.

Speaking on behalf of victims’ families, lawyer Richard Raymond turned the spotlight back on the issue of an incident controller.

He said the families did not support the submission from both Mines Rescue and Solid Energy that the mine manager or a statutory mine manager should be the incident controller.

Instead, Raymond said the families were advocating that the incident controller have a first class mine manager’s ticket, work closely with the police and make the crucial decisions on matters relating to the mine with the police.

The inquiry was also told that Neville Rockhouse, whose son Ben Rockhouse died in the tragedy, supported the implementation of check inspectors.

The inquiry into the disaster, which has spanned more than 48 days with evidence heard from 57 witnesses, will conclude this afternoon.