It is not often that a potential H&S issue makes the headlines (except when there is a fatality) but the slushy "scandal" has proved the exception.

National Party leader Simon Bridges has described the purchase of $1m worth of slushy machines by the Department of Corrections as wasteful expenditure.

Corrections says the purchase was a health & wellbeing measure to help prevent prison staff from overheating during hot summer conditions.

H&S practitioners face this dilemma every day: seeking funds to implement an intervention, and being asked to justify the expenditure in terms of the expected reduction in risk.

In the slushy case, what does the team think: wasteful expenditure or justifiable intervention?