Father would not have let son go down Pike River mine

The father of a man who died in the Pike River mine says he would not have let his son underground had he known about the concerns expressed by a leading geologist.

The Royal Commission sitting in Greymouth is inquiring into the disaster at the West Coast coal mine in November, which left 29 miners and contractors dead.

Jane Newman, a geologist and director of Newman Energy Research with more than 31 years experience in the Pike River area, said today Pike River Coal Ltd did not have a proper understanding of the geology of its coal mine.

Her concerns led to her telling her husband, also a geologist, not to enter the mine last August.

"He asked me why not, I said 'it's just everything, the geology'. My feeling at that stage was that things were converging on a situation I wasn't happy about," Dr Newman said.

Bernie Monk, spokesman for the families of the 29 men killed, said hearing Dr Newman's evidence had been "hard". His son Michael died at Pike River.

"It's hindsight now, If we all knew, I wouldn't have let my son down the mine. It is hard, I wish I just had all that time all over again, but we have to move on."

Mr Monk said the families were still doing it tough.

"I had lunch with a couple of them today and they shed tears. They still...want our men back."

He said the commission was progressing well and he was confident changes would be made so tragedies like Pike River would not be repeated.

Former chief inspector of coal mines Robin Hughes, who started giving evidence today, criticised mine safety changes made by National governments in the 1990s.

"The explosion at Pike River mine...had its origins in the repealing of the Coal Mine Act and regulations in 1993," Mr Hughes said.

"The unwillingness of government officials up to and including the prime minister of the day to act on advice offered by a number of individuals resulted in the loss of a robust coal mines inspectorate, staffed by the most experienced and skilled personnel available."

Once mine inspectors became part of the Occupational Health and Safety (OSH) and the Department of Labour the "proactive" inspecting of coal mines greatly reduced, Mr Hughes said.

"The OSH view was that workplace health and safety was primarily the responsibility of the mine's operators," he said.

Mr Hughes also questioned the qualifications of people employed as inspectors after the 1990s.

"The inspectorate changed from being a active and expert participant in coal mining safety to a reactive and substantially less well qualified organisation," he said.

"It became an ambulance at the bottom of the cliff and not a fence at the top."

After the lunch break he went over safety practices under the old mining inspectorate.

Under examination by counsel for the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) Nigel Hampton QC, Mr Hughes said there may be "some benefit" to reintroducing check inspectors which were abolished in 1992.

Mr Hampton also questioned Mr Hughes about a series of ignition incidents at Solid Energy mines over the past two months and asked how quickly they would have been responded to under the old mines inspectorate system.

Mr Hughes replied saying that all of the incidents would have been investigated "as soon as possible".

Yesterday it was revealed by Mr Hampton that the Department of Labour only investigated two of the four ignition incidents.