LETTER TO THE EDITOR: DELAY IN PASSING THE WORK HEALTH SAFETY BILL
2011

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After more than six years of legal battles, Mr Madeley’s heartbroken mother, Andrea Madeley, has added another ally in her quest to strengthen South Australia’s workplace safety laws  State Coroner Mark Johns.

In a scathing report released yesterday, Mr Johns said: “It is extremely disturbing that SafeWork SA failed to carry out an audit following Mr Madeley’s death for nearly six years, and only then at the same time as an inquest was started.

“I simply cannot understand how such a workplace existed in South Australia in 2004, bearing in mind the existence of SafeWork SA and its various predecessors, and the Workcover Corporation, which also takes an interest.”

Mr Madeley was crushed to death when his dust coat became entangled in an unguarded, 40-year-old boring machine, built in the USSR.

Mr Johns said: “A horizontal boring machine had been operated at Diemould for years in a condition which could only be described as deplorably unsafe. It could have been guarded, but was not. It could have had a braking system, but did not. It could have had an automated lubrication system, but did not.

“Many other things could have been done, but any one of these would have been sufficient to save Mr Madeley’s life.

“It (an audit) could have commenced in June 2004 but it was not until this inquest was about to be commenced (last year) that a compliance project was actually conducted.”

 He said the conditions belonged in the 1950s and not the modern age, where occupational health and safety had become a key part of the workplace.

“Mr Madeley’s death was preventable. A regime of proper inspection by SafeWork SA … (might) have identified such an obviously unsafe machine … and prevented its further use,” Mr Johns said.

Mrs Madeley said the process (since her son’s death) “has just about killed me, but this has to be the most positive thing that has come out of the whole process.”

She would never find closure over her son’s death, but the Coroner’s findings did support her crusade for better workplace practices. “SafeWork SA is not doing enough, pull your finger out,” she said outside court.

 ”Let’s not wait until someone dies, let’s be proactive, not reactive.” Since her son’s death, Ms Madeley has set up Voices for Industrial Death, an organisation that fights for workers’ safety rights.

In 2009, Diemould was fined $72,000 in the Industrial Court  a third of the cost of replacing the horizontal borer  after pleading guilty to a breach of workplace safety laws.

Mr Johns also called for “major reform” to the current system of criminal prosecution for fatal industrial accidents. “In my opinion, it is just plain wrong that the prosecution of Diemould took five years to arrive at a plea of guilty. There must be a way to improve that,” Mr Johns said.

Industrial Relations Minister Bernard Finnigan said he would need to read the Coroner’s findings before any action was taken.

“I take seriously the need to avoid industrial deaths and I trust the Coroner’s findings will be of assistance in this regard,” he said.

During the inquest into Mr Madeley’s death, there were suggestions some of the Diemould employees testimonies had been “coached” by the company in order to avoid responsibility for the accident.

Mrs Madeley said it was “symbolic” of the way Diemould had handled her son’s death.

“They should just tell the truth, they should not have to be forced to court to do it,” she said.

“If you make mistakes and apologise you can understand that.

“It was always about their (Diemould) legal responsibility.”

A Safe Work SA spokesman said it was reviewing the findings and would make a statement at a later date.

MY COMMENT

 
  RALLY TO:   

 *    SUPPORT ARK TRIBE  

*    CALL FOR THE CLOSURE OF THE ABCC  

*    DEMAND EFFECTIVE NATIONAL OHS&W LAWS

 time:        8.30 am

day:         Wednesday

date:        24 November   2010

venue:    Victoria Square, Adelaide

This rally is being held on the day that Ark receives the verdict of the court.

Be there to show your support!

…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

ASBESTOS VICTIMS MEMORIAL DAY SERVICES ……………………………………………………………………………………………………….   Asbestos Disease Society of SA Inc’s ceremony:  time:             7.30 – 9am    day:             Friday

date:           November 26th 2010

venue:        Jack Watkins Memorial Park                     Churchill Rd Bus (Stop 19)                     Kilburn                                                  Breakfast will be provided by SA Unions and there will be a Memorial Balloon Launch at  8 am  followed by speakers etc                                         …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….     Asbestos Victims Association ceremony:time:     10:30 am to 11:30 am

day:      Friday

date:     26th November  2010

venue:   Pitman Park SALISBURY

                                (adjacent to the main Salisbury shopping centre)ARK TRIBE

Ark Tribe is a South Australian construction worker who is facing 6 months jail for attending a safety meeting on site and refusing to dob in his workmates when instructed by the Australian Building Construction Commission (ABCC) to attend their inquisition. The ABCC was established by John Howard to put pressure on construction workers on behalf of construction companies. Deputy PM Julia Gillard promised to close down the ABCC, but has not done so.

Other workers do not face such draconian laws when they are working to improve health & safety on the job. As a construction worker Ark Tribe has no right to remain silent about what was discussed by his fellow workers at a meeting to discuss OHS&W; he was expected to incriminate himself and his workmates because this unfair and archaic law says he must.

There has been no suggestion or indication from the employers, the ABCC, or those prosecuting that Ark Tribe was involved in any activity which breached any law nor has he been charged with any breaches of the law other than the accusation that he failed to attend an ABCC inquisition.

No one should be jailed or threatened jail because they believe it is a basic human right of all workers in a democratic country to demand that their OHS&W laws are of the highest standard & that they have the right to remain silent about union meetings they attend to achieve this aim.

Are bosses forced by law to reveal details of meetings where they discuss OHS&W or the watering down of OHS&W???

Be there and let Ark know you care.

DON’T RISK 2ND RATE OH&S LAWS (an ACTU CAMPAIGN)

The Australian federal government is in the process of standardising Australia’s OH&S laws. When it started this process, Deputy PM Julia Gillard promised Australian unions that the government would ensure that it would result in the highest standard laws. However, instead of giving us best practice and effective laws, the Rudd government wants to water down the laws we have in each state. It is time to take a stand to demand that our OHS&W laws are the best they possibly can be - especially as about 8000 Australian workers die from work-related accidents and disease every year.

It is totally unacceptable that a Labor government, which is supposed to be looking after workers should be responsible for undermining our health, safety and welfare by giving us second rate laws.

Support the ACTU Don’t Risk @nd Rate Safety Laws Campaign.

* THE UN CHARTER OF HUMAN RIGHTS SAYS THAT OH&S IS A BASIC HUMAN   RIGHT

* DON’T RISK 2ND RATE HEALTH & SAFETY LAWS

* YOUR OH&S RIGHTS AT WORK ARE WORTH FIGHTING FOR TOO

* SUPPORT THE ACTU UNION CHARTER OF WORKPLACE RIGHTS FOR OH&S &  WORKERS’   COMPENSATION

* ABOLISH THE ABCC & LET ARK GO FREE

 For further information about the Ark Tribe campaign, visit: http://www.rightsonsite.org.au/

Adelaide Office of the CFMEU
Level 1,  32 South Terrace
Adelaide 5000
Phone:     08 8231 5532

For further information about the ACTU Don’t Risk 2nd Rate Safety Laws campaign, visit:

http://www.actu.asn.au/Campaigns/HealthSafety/default.aspx

For further information about the ACTU UNION CHARTER OF WORKPLACE RIGHTS FOR OH&S &  WORKERS’ COMPENSATION visit: http://www.actu.asn,au/Campaigns/HealthSafety/News/UnionCharterofWorkplaceRightsforOHSandWorkersCompensatiionPetition.aspx

Show the Charter to your local MP & ask him or her to commit to the principles contained in it

SA Unions
46 Greenhill Road,
Wayville SA 5034
Telephone:     (08) 8279 2222
Facsimile:        (08) 8279 2223

Email:             saunions@saunions.org.au

ACTU 

Level 6/365 Queen Street
Melbourne
Vic 3000
Australia
Telephone:    1300 362 223 (local call cost)
Telephone:     (03) 9664 7333
Facsimile:       (03) 9600 0050

posted by Andy Alcock 

 

RESCUE OF THE CHILEAN MINERS

FROM THE SAN JOSE MINE

REMINDS US OF CHILE’S PAINFUL

PAST

This week I was sent 2 articles commenting on the rescue of the Chilean miners  from the San Jose Mine and reminding readers of Chile’s troubled past. One was by John Pilger, the progressive Australian journalist, which was sent to me by Don Sutherland, the National Industrial Officer of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, who  added his own moving comment.

In 2004, I visited Santiago for a few days with my wife, Cathy, during a trip to the Carribean and Latin America.

The rescue of 33 miners in Chile is an extraordinary drama filled with pathos and heroism. It is also a media windfall for the Chilean government, whose every beneficence is recorded by a forest of cameras. One cannot fail to be impressed. However, like all great media events, it is a façade.

The accident that trapped the miners is not unusual in Chile and is the inevitable consequence of a ruthless economic system that has barely changed since the dictatorship of General Augusto Pinochet. Copper is Chile’s gold, and the frequency of mining disasters keeps pace with prices and profits. There are, on average, 39 fatal accidents every year in Chile’s privatised mines. The San Jose mine, where the men work, became so unsafe in 2007 it had to be closed – but not for long. On July 30 last, a labour department report warned again of “serious safety deficiencies”, but the minister took no action. Six days later, the men were entombed.

For all the media circus at the rescue site, contemporary Chile is a country of the unspoken. At the Villa Grimaldi, in the suburbs of the capital Santiago, a sign says: “The forgotten past is full of memory”. This was the torture centre where hundreds of people were murdered and disappeared for opposing the fascism that General Augusto Pinochet and his business allies brought to Chile. Its ghostly presence is overseen by the beauty of the Andes, and the man who unlocks the gate used to live nearby and remembers the screams.

I was taken there one wintry morning in 2006 by Sara De Witt, who was imprisoned as a student activist and now lives in London. She was electrocuted and beaten, yet survived. Later, we drove to the home of Salvador Allende, the great democrat and reformer who perished when Pinochet seized power on September 11, 1973 – Latin America’s own 9-11. His house is a silent white building without a sign or a plaque.

Everywhere, it seems, Allende’s name has been eliminated. Only in the lone memorial in the cemetery are the words engraved “Presidente de la Republica” as part of a remembrance of the “ejecutados Politicos”: those “executed for political reasons”. Allende died by his own hand as Pinochet bombed the presidential palace with British planes as the American ambassador watched.

Today, Chile is a democracy, though many would dispute that, notably those in the barrios forced to scavenge for food and steal electricity. In 1990, Pinochet bequeathed a constitutionally compromised system as a condition of his retirement and the military’s withdrawal to the political shadows. This ensures that the broadly reformist parties, known as Concertacion, are permanently divided or drawn into legitimising the economic designs of the heirs of the dictator. At the last election, the right-wing Coalition for Change, the creation of Pinochet’s ideologue Jaime Guzman, took power under President Sebastian Piñera. The bloody extinction of true democracy that began with the death of Allende was, by stealth, complete.

Piñera is a billionaire who controls a slice of the mining, energy and retail industries. He made his fortune in the aftermath of Pinochet’s coup and during the free-market “experiments” of the zealots from the University of Chicago, known as the Chicago Boys. His brother and former business partner, Jose Piñera, a labour minister under Pinochet, privatised mining and state pensions and all but destroyed the trade unions. This was applauded in Washington as an “economic miracle”, a model of the new cult of neo-liberalism that would sweep the continent and ensure control from the north.

Today Chile is critical to President Barack Obama’s rollback of the independent democracies in Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela. Piñera’s closest ally is Washington’s main man, Juan Manuel Santos, the new president of Colombia, home to seven US bases and an infamous human rights record familiar to Chileans who suffered under Pinochet’s terror.

Post-Pinochet Chile has kept its own enduring abuses in shadow. The families still attempting to recover from the torture or disappearance of a loved one bear the prejudice of the state and employers. Those not silent are the Mapuche people, the only indigenous nation the Spanish conquistadors could not defeat. In the late 19th century, the European settlers of an independent Chile waged their racist War of Extermination against the Mapuche who were left as impoverished outsiders. During Allende’s thousand days in power this began to change. Some Mapuche lands were returned and a debt of justice was recognised.

Since then, a vicious, largely unreported war has been waged against the Mapuche. Forestry corporations have been allowed to take their land, and their resistance has been met with murders, disappearances and arbitrary prosecutions under “anti terrorism” laws enacted by the dictatorship. In their campaigns of civil disobedience, none of the Mapuche has harmed anyone. The mere accusation of a landowner or businessman that the Mapuche “might” trespass on their own ancestral lands is often enough for the police to charge them with offences that lead to Kafkaesque trials with faceless witnesses and prison sentences of up to 20 years. They are, in effect, political prisoners.

While the world rejoices at the spectacle of the miners’ rescue, 38 Mapuche hunger strikers have not been news. They are demanding an end to the Pinochet laws used against them, such as “terrorist arson”, and the justice of a real democracy. On October 9, all but one of the hunger strikers ended their protest after 90 days without food. A young Mapuche, Luis Marileo, says he will go on. On October 18, President Piñera is due to give a lecture on “current events” at the London School of Economics. He should be reminded of their ordeal and why.

 

 

 

The Editor

The Weekend Australian Magazine

GPO Box 4245

SYDNEY NSW 2001

  

magazinefeedback@theaustralian.com.au

 

Dear Sir/Madam

 

RE:    LETTER TO THE EDITOR – THE LESSONS FROM THE BP OIL SPILL

 

Congratulations to Ed Caesar for his insightful article Blood, Oil and Money (TWEAM 2-3.10.10). It is a great expose of how

BP’s and Transocean’s greed for profits led  to disaster after the explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in the Gulf of

Mexico earlier this year.

 

The tragic loss of 11 workers’ lives and the resulting oil spill, which caused a massive environmental crisis in the Gulf, were

completely avoidable and only occurred because both corporations refused to implement adequate safety standards. 

 

In identifying the major reasons for the disaster, Ed Caesar refers to governments who “suckled on the oil”. I would add that a

major part of the problem is the fact that governments will not legislate for optimum health and safety standards, effective laws 

and the enforcement of them.

 

Currently, in Australia, the federal government is standardising all the nation’s OHS and welfare laws. This is something that is

long overdue. However, the problem is that the government is also watering down the current standards that are required in each

state and territory.

 

All too often, corporations like BP, are allowed to make huge profits at the expense of health and safety and environmental care.

Many executives consider that death, injury, disease and environmental damage is just collateral damage in the rush to make

excessive profits.

 

Access Economics estimates that over 8000 Australian Australian workers die every year from work-related accidents and

disease. This is likely to increase if the Gillard Government persists in making our OHS&W laws less effective.

 

Will we learn the lessons from this tragedy or will we continue to see an increase in the number of lost lives and environmental

disasters?

 

Yours sincerely

 

Andrew (Andy) Alcock

 

 

ARK TRIBE, THE ABCC & THE AUSTRALIAN CRISIS IN OHS&W 

Introduction

I was asked by the members of the Eco Socialist Convergence in South Australia to prepare a pamphlet about the struggles by the union movement to have the most effective OHS&W laws in Australia to protect workers from death, disease and injury in our workplaces and the abolition of the anachronistic ABCC (Australian Building and Construction Commission) and the dropping of charges by it against Adelaide construction worker, Ark Tribe, who could face 6 months gaol.

As I began to consider the obstacles being faced to having effective OHS&W laws introduces in Australia, I realised that this task really needed something longer than a pamphlet to analyse them in more detail.

Some readers may think that I am being unnecessarily alarmist, given that OHS&W has gradually improved over the past 20 years. However, I believe that we have almost reached a stalemate to further improvements.

There are many factors as to why this is happening eg the resistance by the opposition of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and many employers (but not all) to the introduction of improved regulations and codes; the reluctance of politicians (Liberal and ALP) to introduce more effective laws; the failure by the media to give priority to industrial accidents (compare the focus on traffic accidents); insufficient number of inspectors to enforce codes and laws; apathy of the general public; the reluctance of many ACTU and some union leaders to give priority to effective OHS&W campaigns etc

Humphrey McQueen has analysed many of these factors in his brilliant book Framework of Flesh – Builders’ Labourers Battle for Health & Safety.

My aim is to give a brief background of Australia’s standing in OHS&W in a world context and to encourage progressive people to understand that OHS&W is a top priority for ordinary working people in Australia and needs our urgent attention now. I also hope that it will challenge those who were hitherto uncommitted about OHS&W to struggle for best practice OHS&W laws, to give support to Ark Tribe and demand the abolition of the ABCC.

Some believe that Ark might well win on a legal technicality, however, the changes in our OHS&W laws will still occur and we need to fight for best practice, effective legislation.

If Ark still faces imprisonment, obviously we should fight to prevent this happening and to struggle for the ABCC to be abolished.

A Brief International Summary

One of the most concerning issues facing working class people world-wide is the issue of health, safety and welfare of workers. We have all heard the tragic stories of the huge death tolls of miners in China and South Africa; silicosis-TB amongst Bolivian tin miners (who were dying in large numbers at about 30 years of age), miners and process workers of the killer dust, asbestos etc.

Of course, this is not a new situation. Many of us have read of the conditions that prevailed in the factories that were built during the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Often, it was death and disease at work that were the major reasons for the establishment of trade unions.

There has been the expectation by many owners of industries for centuries that workers should be grateful to have work and, if there are risks to life and health, they should be grateful to have a job! I would argue that many employers in the world and Australia today share that view.

According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), across the world:

• Each year, more than two million working women and men die as a result of
• work-related accidents and diseases
•  
• Workers suffer approximately 270 million occupational accidents each year, and
• fall victim to some 160 million incidents of work-related illnesses
•  
• Hazardous substances kill 440,000 workers annually
• - asbestos claims 100,000 lives

• One worker dies every 15 seconds worldwide – 6,000 workers die every day
• Cancer is the biggest killer of workers and most workers who die from work-related cancer die from lung cancer and mesothelioma caused by their exposure to asbestos dust.

This was the reason why the ITUC mounted a Zero Occupational Cancer Campaign (ZOCC) recently for several years to raise awareness about carcinogens in workplaces and to have asbestos universally banned.

More people die because of work than those fighting in wars.

The situation has become so bad, that the international trade union movement observes an International Workers’ Memorial Day on 28 April each year. This day is recognised officially by the ILO, the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and by the governments of many countries including Argentina, Belgium, Argentina, Bermuda, Brazil. Canada, Dominican Republic, Luxembourg, Panama, Peru, Portugal, Spain Thailand, Taiwan and the US.

It commemorates workers who have been killed, injured or diseased as a result of work and those who have been threatened, imprisoned, tortured or killed because they fought for effective OHS&W conditions.

Unions in other countries are campaigning to have their governments give official recognition to the day as well eg Benin, Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Malta, Nepal, NZ, Romania, Singapore and Britain.

According to the Maplecroft Health and Safety Risk Index (HSRI), worldwide, Denmark achieves the best occupational health and safety ranking, followed by Luxembourg, Switzerland, Sweden and Finland.

Nine countries fall into the ‘extreme risk’ category, with the Democratic Republic of Congo worst rated, followed by Nigeria, Ethiopia and Bangladesh. The UK is ranked the 30 safest nation, placing it at the mid-point of the ‘low risk’ group. Some other major OECD nations have worse rankings, including the USA, France, Germany, Italy and Spain. Australia is also placed in the low risk group, but it is generally agreed that it does not perform as well as Britain.

The situation in Australia

Well, some might argue, what is the fuss if we are in the low risk category?

The shocking truth is that in Australia each year:

• almost 500,000 work related accidents occur
• 690,000 workplace injuries or illnesses occur
• more than 7,000 Australians die annually from work related diseases and accidents
• (this is far in excess of the the national annual road toll)
• the cost to the Australian economy is a staggering $57 billion.

The above statistics are a national shame for a country which claims to be a modern one and where most citizens enjoy above average wages and conditions.

Incidentally, South Australia is often known as the Mesothelioma State because South Australia has the highest incidence of mesothelioma deaths than anywhere else in Asutralia.

Attitudes of Employers

During my years as a union OH&S officer, I have encountered varying attitudes to the issue of OHS&W by employers. I have met many who are are diligent in organising their workplaces to be safe and healthy for their employees.

However, there are many employers who treat this important aspect of their work with disdain and think that it is over the top. There is a group that seem to think that because they are providing employees with work, that they should accept the risks.

How often have you heard the comment when there are accidents: ?hey know what they are getting into, so they shouldn’t be surprised if things go wrong!

Many of those who have been criminally negligent and actively opposed best safety standards do not consider that they are doing anything illegal.

One glaring example is the attitudes of employers in the asbestos mining, processing and transport industries. The worst example was of course James Hardie was the worst example. Matt Peacock’s 2009 well researched book, Killer Company James Hardie Exposed, gives a detailed account of this company’s criminal behaviour which has contributed substantially to the fact that tens of thousands of Australian workers are dying well before they should be and they are suffering dreadfully painful deaths.

Workers and members of the public were lied to about the dangers asbestos and true nature of their medical conditions. There were attempts by the employer to delay court actions in the hope that the victims would die before receiving their compensation. James Hardie tried to relocate overseas and leave insufficient monies for compensation.

Of course, there is a double standard here. The same principles do no apply to negligent drivers on our roads. They meet the full force of law if their negligence injures or kills others. And this should be the case.

ACCI (the Australian Council of Commerce and Industry), the peak employer body in Australia resists the introduction of effective new codes arguing that there are too many OHS&W laws. In 2005, ACCI published a Modern Workplace: Safer Workplace Blueprint for Improving OHS. Much of it was a complaint about Australia’s OHS&W laws and expressed the desire to have less legislation and opposed the introduction of any laws including Industrial Manslaughter (more about that later).

It released the document on 28 April, IWMD, the very day that millions around the world were involved in ceremonies to remember workers, friends and loved-ones who had died or suffered in the workplace.

On one hand, Australia’s OHS&W laws need to be uniform in all states, but they also need to be effective and they need to be adequately enforced.

Many employers promote the concept of behavioural safety. This approach to OHS&W relies on constantly monitoring the safety performance of employees and does not concentrate on the insistence that employers provide safe and healthy workplaces. Those pushing this philosophy tend to blame the workers for accidents, injury and disease

Humphrey McQueen describes many of these attitudes in Framework of Flesh.

A young Adelaide apprentice, Daniel Madeley, died in April 2004 after his dustcoat caught in an unguarded horizontal boring machine at Diemould Tooling Services, dragging him into a gigantic drill and flinging him around causing horrific injuries.

A spokesperson for the company stated in court that the company owner at the time of the accident was someone who regarded safety improvements as a bit unnecessary! The company was fined $72,000 for breaches of SA’s OHS&W regulations.

WorkChoices

Most would agree that the major reason why the Howard Government was defeated at the 2007 federal elections was the issue of WorkChoices. The Australian trade union movement mounted a very costly, spectacular and effective campaign in the lead up to that election and that was a major factor in the Howard defeat.

The ALP promised to overturn WorkChoices, abolish the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) and do something about unifying and extending Australia’s OHS&W laws.

The ABCC

The ABCC was created by the Howard Government to put pressure on the CFMEU just as it saided and abetted the actions of Patricks against the MUA in 1998. The ABCC is an anachronistic body which has been given strong arbitrary powers to impose intolerable control over the industrial and OH&S activities of construction workers. Howard sought to create a situation where building and construction workers would be blocked from demanding safe working conditions, which many construction employers did not want to pay.

Ark Tribe, a construction worker in SA, faces 6 months gaol because he held meetings to address OH&S issues at his worksite at Flinders Medical Centre and refused to give details of that meeting to the ABCC .

A political party claiming to support workers would have abolished such a body in its first week of office just as Whitlam abolished the National Service Act in 1972.

The existence of such a body should not be happening in a civilised country in the 21st century.

The campaign to abolish the ABCC and prevent Ark Tribe from going to gaol is a very important one, but I believe that it should be seen in the context of the present threat to our OHS&W laws during the process of harmonisation.

“Harmonisationof OH&S Laws

Arising from the promises of the 2007 election promises, the Rudd and Gillard Governments have been standardising our OH&S laws in the nation in an exercise that began in 2008. Many unionists involved in OHS&W wanted to avoid the use of the word harmonisation as it was a term used by the Howard Government and most workers did not trust a process to merge our OHS&W laws if Howard or Abbott were in control of the process.

The unifying of the laws is something that OHS&W activists in the Australian union movement have been demanding for a period of over 2 decades. During that time, the union OHS&W activists have always argued that national uniform OHS&W laws effectively protect workers and that they should be effectively enforced.

It  would be a good thing if the harmonisation process was leading to best practice legislation with effective enforcement. The fact is, however, that what we are going to get will be seriously watered down OH&S laws, which could lead to even higher levels of work-related disease, accidents and death.

Of particular concern is the fact that existing asbestos codes and regulations will become less stringent. Exposure to asbestos dust is currently the biggest killer of Australian workers.

NSW OH&S legislation allows for unions in that state to initiate prosecution of employers alleged to be criminally negligent. This will not be retained in the new national laws. There are many other changes which will make it more difficult for Health & Safety Representatives (H&SRs) to play the role that they can in SA and other states to protect the health and safety of fellow workers.

It is obvious that the outcome will be disastrous for Australian workers.

The ACTU Leadership & Attitudes to OHS&W

The ACTU leadership over the years claims that OHS&W is a major issue, however, the action to demonstrate this commitment has not always been very strong. When I first got involved with the ACTU OH&S Committee in the late 1980s, it met once every 2 years. A number of activists managed to change this so that it was gradually increased to 4 times a year which is still the case.

The ACTU Assistant Secretary responsible for OHS&W when I first was first on the Committee basically expected to tell the committee members about OHS&W issues and did not want delegate feedback. It was quite a struggle to get motions put, carried and then actioned. I don’t think he understood that unions are actually supposed to be democratic!

At that time, the ACTU was generally way behind the latest thinking in preventive strategies. For example, when most modern manual handling codes had already ruled out weight limits for workers and were promoting the concept of no worker should lift a weight beyond which s/he was able to manage and engineering solutions to MH problems, this ACTU assistant secretary was still pushing for weight limits.

Further, the welfare aspect of OHS&W was considered to be a joke. Once, when we were considering an ACTU recommended accident/injury report form, I noticed that amongst the multiple choice boxes on the draft form, there were none asking injured workers about psychological injuries. I did not get much support for this position then, but now, nobody but the worst employers, ACCI (the Australian Council of Commerce and Industry), the peak employer body in Australia resists the introduction of effective new codes arguing that there are too many OHS&W laws.

Most unions have workers’ compensation officers or hire experienced lawyers to assist their members with workers compensation claims. However, very few have specialist OH&S officers to promte prevention and assist members in their struggles for safer and healthier workplaces.

In the late 1990s, the ACTU initiated a new program called Organising Works to address the issue of declining union membership and to promote improved grass root actions in more workplace to resolve industrial issues. Organising Works was brilliant except that one of the program’s key trainers promoted the idea that unions did not need specialist OH&S officers. As a result, one union secretary in SA who is now a parlamentarian abolished the OH&S officer position in his union. Quite appropriately, there was a great member backlash, but the position was not replaced

ACTU OH&S Unit

In 1981, Dr John Matthews was the founding leader of the ACTU-Victorian Trades Hall Council OH&S Unit. Over the years, this unit has assisted large numbers of union activists on OHS&W matters and represented the union movement in trying to achieve best practice OHS&W codes and laws.

During then time of the National OH&S Commission, the ACTU and ACCI (the Australian Council of Commerce and Industry), the peak employer body, received grants to employ a number of staff in their respective organisations.

For a number of years, from the late 1990s to about 2005, the ACTU employed 3 well qualified and experienced staff in this unit. This dedicated group of people were involved in negotiating with the NOHSC and other agencies preparing national codes, working on the ACTU OH&S Committee papers, assisting union leaders activists with expert advice, organising OHS&W campaigns every year to coincide with IWMD and union OH&S conferences and providing up to date OHS&W information to the union movement.

Sadly, they were basically stampeded out of the unit in 2005 by Richard Marles, an ACTU assistant secretary who is now a federal parliamentarian. They were replaced with one officer.

The person appointed was Steve Mullins who did not have experience in OHS&W, but worked extremely hard to get control of the job. He achieved much, but obviously could not match the achievements of the 3 officers who preceded him.

OHS&W & Elections

The ACTU usually goes into overdrive when there are federal or state elections to promote current union campaigns.When I was a member of the ACTU OH&S Committee in 2006, I successfully moved a motion that OHS&W be a major component of the ACTU Your Rights at Work Campaign which was a major reason for the defeat of the Howard Government at the 2007 elections.

Also, just prior to the elections, the ACTU OH&S Committee finalised the Union Charter of Workplace Rights for OHS & Workers’ Compensation. This statement was seen as a very important document by the union movement as it assumed that workers have a basic human right to have the best OHS&W conditions in their workplaces, effective legislation and strong enforcement of it and adequate compensation if they still became injured or diseased.

The ACTU OH&S Committee recommended that the Charter be used as an election tool and to call on activists to ask candidates to commit to it during the campaign in the lead up to the 2007 election.

Sadly the issue of OHS&W was not central to that campaign. Basically, any mention of OHS&W was left to that courageous worker, Bernie Banton, who was terminally ill because he was in the final stages of mesothelioma. Bernie took on former Health Minister Tony Abbott to have the drug, Alimta, made available on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme to mesothelioma sufferers. This drug helps to alleviate the symptoms of cancer and prolongs life and was available for sufferers of ordinary lung cancer, but not mesothelioma of the lung. Abbott was not going to give in, but changed his mind just before the 2007 election thanks to the actions of Bernie and some very callous remarks made by Abbott.

To be fair, former ACTU Secretary, Greg Combet, also accompanied Bernie Banton in court appearances to ensure that asbestos victims received more adequate compensation than what the James Hardie corporation was originally prepared to give. This battle also proved victorious.

Some unions did promote the Charter, but it was not promoted by the ACTU leadership. Indeed, during this time, it was very difficult for many union members to find it on the ACTU website.

It should be noted that Greg Combet, the former ACTU secretary was one of a number of union leaders who successfully entered Federal Parliament in 2007. Union activists might well ask what are these MHRs and senators doing to ensure we get the most effective OHS&W laws?

Then Deputy PM Julia Gillard, addressed the 2008 ACTU OH&S Conference in Melbourne. I asked her if she would personally commit to the Charter. Her response was that she would not do so as she had not seen it. Steve Mullins told me that her had given it to her personally.

At the 2009 ACTU OH&S Conference in Sydney, the delegates carried a resolution urging the ACTU Executive to organise a campaign to promote OHS&W that would be as well resourced as the Your Rights at Work Campaign (YRWC). In response, the ACTU initiated a campaign entitled DON’T RISK 2ND RATE SAFETY (DRSRS) which is supposed to pressure the Government to introduce effective laws which will be effectively enforced.

The leadership activity around this campaign is so low that many key union members do not know of its existence.  At an Ark Tribe rally in 2009, I worked with a group of comrades to encourage the several thousand present ro sign a petition for the DRSRS Campaign. Out of several hundred activists attending the rally I spoke to not one knew that the ACTU even had a campaign!

The union movement in Australia is very fortunate that the Victorian Trades Hall Council (VTHC) OH&S Unit exists because it has done a great job in providing OHS&W resources to assist the ACTU during the harmonisation exercise as well as promoting the important ongoing OHS&W campaigns.

Zero Occupational Cancer Campaign (ZOCC)

This campaign organised by the ITUC should have provided a great opportunity for the union movement in Australia to educate the public about work-related cancers. Cancer is the biggest killer of workers world-wide and in Australia, the asbestos-related cancers are the ones that claim most workers’ lives.

In 2008, the ACTU OH&S Unit organised a one day briefing for union officials. About 30 attended and most were officers responsible for OHS&W. At this day, there was agreement that the union movement would make this a large campaign that would involve grass-root union activists across the nation. It was also agreed that there would be a national conference inolving unions, researchers, cancer councils, cancer sufferers and the wider community.

In late 2009, there was a successful one day conference, kNOw Cancer in the Workplace Conference, which involved the Australian Cancer Council. The papers can be found on the Cancer Council’s website, but not on the ACTU’s.

ZOCC was picked up more energetically by the Victorian Trades Hall Council (VTHC) OH&S Unit, which organised a number of events and carried a lot of information on its website.. A few unions independently organised their own events and carried information on their websites eg AMWU, AEU, PSA/CPSU . In South Australia, the PSA/CPSU and SA Unions held half day seminars during SafeWork SA’s Safe Work Month in 2008.

It is interesting to compare what happened during this campaign in other parts of the world. As I mentioned earlier, the campaign continued for about 5 years internationally. The Canadian Auto Workers prepared a manual for its members, which explained how cancers are formed, what chemicals and other agents cause them, suggested actions to identify carcinogens in workplaces and to have them replaced with safer products. There were goals to drastically reduce the number of carcinogenic agents used in workplaces world-wide and to achieve an international ban on asbestos.

Britain’s Hazards Magazine repeatedly included information about the campaign. The International . The International Metalworkers Federation prepared a very informative booklet, which was used by its affiliates and other unions around the world.

The issue of occupational cancer is a big one in this country and the ACTU leadership should have shown greater leadership to ensure that ZOCC continued for a longer time and reached many more Australian workers than it did.

Why OHS&W is not deemed as a major issue by the ALP & some union leaders

OHS&W is one of the great issues that the progressive movement needs to adopt far more strongly than it has in the past. ALP governments are not willing to push this issue as strongly as they should if ithey were truly supporting the Australian working class.

This also affects the ACTU as many of its leaders eventually become ALP MPs and they do not want to take stands that are likely to get them off side with the conservative elements in ACCI and the ALP.

ACCI representatives almost always push for OHS&W codes that are not effective and certainly oppose the introduction of Industrial Manslaughter Legislation. Such legislation would ensure that negligent employers whose negligence leads to death, serious injury or disease would personally be liable to be fined and/or serve prison terms.

The only ALP government in Australia to support such legislation is the ACT government.

This is the reason why progressive unionists and activists need to be active in promoting OHS&W

I thought it was amazing that the Federal Government was so inept in defending itself during the public debate over the tragic deaths of the insulation workers while carrying out installation work as part of the Federal Government home insulation program. virtually accused Peter Garrett of industrial manslaughter.  

Government members could have pointed out that, in every state and territory of Australia, there are already OHS&W laws that require employers to undergo a risk assessment procedure and to provide their employees with adequate training in safe work procedures

before any work begins and to ensure that there is effective supervision. Further, all employers have a duty to provide healthy and safe workplaces and to provide employees with safe equipment and materials to carry out their work safely. Each state and territory have inspectorates to ensure that these laws are adhered to.

Deputy PM, Julia Gillard, was correct when she stated that Peter Garrett cannot be in every roof while the insulation is being installed. However, if it is true he knew that there were poor safety standards involved at the beginning of the program, the responsible course of action on his part would have been to liaise with OH&S authorities around the country to ensure that all involved in the program were trained and were provided with safe systems of work, safe equipment and effective safeguards before the work commenced. Further, inspectorates should have been monitoring the program closely to ensure that safety standards were not being breached.

 Those workers died because there were failures on the part of many key players.

During the public debate, Tony Abbott tried to accuse Peter Garrett of industrial manslaughter. This is interesting because the Liberal and National parties have always opposed the introduction of industrial manslaughter legislation. The only government that has such legislation is the ACT. There have also been attempts to introduce this type of legislation in NSW, Victoria ans SA, but other ALP governments do not want to introduce such legislation either largely because of the reaction by the big employers.

If people who drive in a negligent manner kill or maim others, they expect heavy fines and prison terms. Why should this not the case for negligent employers who through their negligence kill or maim employees? This should be an integral part of an effective OH&S legal system. As I write, the local daily paper, The Advertiser, ran two stories one about a young person driving in a dangerous manner and the other about an industrial death on the desalination plant at Port Stanvac. The first story was on page 3 even though no-one was hurt; the report of the industrial death appeared on page12!

Having worked in the union movement for about 25 years, I know that many union leaders including those in the ALP do not give much priority to OHS&W. For some of those who want to enter parliament, I am sure that there is the consideration of not wanting to get big interests off side, but for many others, they just don’t understand.

This is the challenge. As we struggle to make changes for a safer and healthier future, we need to change

Conclusion

It is my view that all progressive, green and social justice activists should strongly support the campaign to abolish the ABCC and to prevent Ark Tribe from going to prison. However, the ever present issue is the demand for OHS&W codes and laws that protect workers from injury, disease and death.

OUR OHS&W RIGHTS AT WORK ARE WORTH FIGHTING & VOTING FOR TOO!

DON’T RISK 2ND RATE SAFETY!

DON’T RISK 2ND RATE OHS&W CAMPAIGNS!

Andy Alcock

SUGGESTED READING

I would urge all progressive activists to read the 2 books listed below as they describe the tragic situations that have been allowed to occur in Australian workplaces because of inadequate OHS&W laws and lack of effective enforcement of the laws that we have.

Humphrey McQueen: Framework of Flesh – Builders’ Labourers Battle for

Health & Safety (Ginninderra Press)

Matt Peacock: Killer Company (ABC Books)

MESSAGE TO ARK TRIBE

5/11/09 10:09

“Many workers around the country are watching your case with great interest because your courageous stand is about workers’ basic human rights to work in a healthy and safe environment.

As the ABCC tries to bully you and fellow construction workers into not organising over this crucial issue, the Gillard-Rudd government is embarked on watering down our OHS&W laws in Australia.

The struggle to resist this move by the pseudo Rudd Labor government must be resisted as we fight to remove the ABCC. In 2007, the ACTU published a Charter of Workers OH&S Rights. This is based on the UN Charter of Human Rights, but is widened to include the important principles of best practice OH&S & Workers’ Comp & Rehabilitation laws that are needed to achieve the basic human right for workers to be healthy and safe at work. It is important that all rallies to support you demand that our political leaders commit to this Charter and ensure that our national OH&S laws are very strong and not weak as could be the case. All progressive workers and Australian citizens are with you, Ark, as they keep dragging you into court hearing after court hearing. See you in December outside the Adelaide Magistrates’ Court.

A la lucha continua!

Venceremos!

Andy Alcock

former union OH&S officer & human rights activist”

ARK TRIBE, THE ABCC & THE AUSTRALIAN CRISIS IN OHS&W 

Introduction

I was asked by the members of the Eco Socialist Convergence in South Australia to prepare a pamphlet about the struggles by the union movement to have the most effective OHS&W laws in Australia to protect workers from death, disease and injury in our workplaces and the abolition of the anachronistic ABCC (Australian Building and Construction Commission) and the dropping of charges by it against Adelaide construction worker, Ark Tribe, who could face 6 months gaol.

As I began to consider the obstacles being faced to having effective OHS&W laws introduces in Australia, I realised that this task really needed something longer than a pamphlet to analyse them in more detail.

Some readers may think that I am being unnecessarily alarmist, given that OHS&W has gradually improved over the past 20 years. However, I believe that we have almost reached a stalemate to further improvements.

There are many factors as to why this is happening eg the resistance by the opposition of the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and many employers (but not all) to the introduction of improved regulations and codes; the reluctance of politicians (Liberal and ALP) to introduce more effective laws; the failure by the media to give priority to industrial accidents (compare the focus on traffic accidents); insufficient number of inspectors to enforce codes and laws; apathy of the general public; the reluctance of many ACTU and some union leaders to give priority to effective OHS&W campaigns etc

Humphrey McQueen has analysed many of these factors in his brilliant book Framework of Flesh – Builders’ Labourers Battle for Health & Safety.

My aim is to give a brief background of Australia’s standing in OHS&W in a world context and to encourage progressive people to understand that OHS&W is a top priority for ordinary working people in Australia and needs our urgent attention now. I also hope that it will challenge those who were hitherto uncommitted about OHS&W to struggle for best practice OHS&W laws, to give support to Ark Tribe and demand the abolition of the ABCC.

Some believe that Ark might well win on a legal technicality, however, the changes in our OHS&W laws will still occur and we need to fight for best practice, effective legislation.

If Ark still faces imprisonment, obviously we should fight to prevent this happening and to struggle for the ABCC to be abolished.

A Brief International Summary

One of the most concerning issues facing working class people world-wide is the issue of health, safety and welfare of workers. We have all heard the tragic stories of the huge death tolls of miners in China and South Africa; silicosis-TB amongst Bolivian tin miners (who were dying in large numbers at about 30 years of age), miners and process workers of the killer dust, asbestos etc.

Of course, this is not a new situation. Many of us have read of the conditions that prevailed in the factories that were built during the Industrial Revolution in Britain. Often, it was death and disease at work that were the major reasons for the establishment of trade unions.

There has been the expectation by many owners of industries for centuries that workers should be grateful to have work and, if there are risks to life and health, they should be grateful to have a job! I would argue that many employers in the world and Australia today share that view.

According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), across the world:

• Each year, more than two million working women and men die as a result of
• work-related accidents and diseases
•  
• Workers suffer approximately 270 million occupational accidents each year, and
• fall victim to some 160 million incidents of work-related illnesses
•  
• Hazardous substances kill 440,000 workers annually
• - asbestos claims 100,000 lives

• One worker dies every 15 seconds worldwide – 6,000 workers die every day
• Cancer is the biggest killer of workers and most workers who die from work-related cancer die from lung cancer and mesothelioma caused by their exposure to asbestos dust.

This was the reason why the ITUC mounted a Zero Occupational Cancer Campaign (ZOCC) recently for several years to raise awareness about carcinogens in workplaces and to have asbestos universally banned.

More people die because of work than those fighting in wars.

The situation has become so bad, that the international trade union movement observes an International Workers’ Memorial Day on 28 April each year. This day is recognised officially by the ILO, the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and by the governments of many countries including Argentina, Belgium, Argentina, Bermuda, Brazil. Canada, Dominican Republic, Luxembourg, Panama, Peru, Portugal, Spain Thailand, Taiwan and the US.

It commemorates workers who have been killed, injured or diseased as a result of work and those who have been threatened, imprisoned, tortured or killed because they fought for effective OHS&W conditions.

Unions in other countries are campaigning to have their governments give official recognition to the day as well eg Benin, Czech Republic, Finland, Hungary, Malta, Nepal, NZ, Romania, Singapore and Britain.

According to the Maplecroft Health and Safety Risk Index (HSRI), worldwide, Denmark achieves the best occupational health and safety ranking, followed by Luxembourg, Switzerland, Sweden and Finland.

Nine countries fall into the ‘extreme risk’ category, with the Democratic Republic of Congo worst rated, followed by Nigeria, Ethiopia and Bangladesh. The UK is ranked the 30 safest nation, placing it at the mid-point of the ‘low risk’ group. Some other major OECD nations have worse rankings, including the USA, France, Germany, Italy and Spain. Australia is also placed in the low risk group, but it is generally agreed that it does not perform as well as Britain.

The situation in Australia

Well, some might argue, what is the fuss if we are in the low risk category?

The shocking truth is that in Australia each year:

• almost 500,000 work related accidents occur
• 690,000 workplace injuries or illnesses occur
• more than 7,000 Australians die annually from work related diseases and accidents
• (this is far in excess of the the national annual road toll)
• the cost to the Australian economy is a staggering $57 billion.

The above statistics are a national shame for a country which claims to be a modern one and where most citizens enjoy above average wages and conditions.

Incidentally, South Australia is often known as the Mesothelioma State because South Australia has the highest incidence of mesothelioma deaths than anywhere else in Asutralia.

Attitudes of Employers

During my years as a union OH&S officer, I have encountered varying attitudes to the issue of OHS&W by employers. I have met many who are are diligent in organising their workplaces to be safe and healthy for their employees.

However, there are many employers who treat this important aspect of their work with disdain and think that it is over the top. There is a group that seem to think that because they are providing employees with work, that they should accept the risks.

How often have you heard the comment when there are accidents: ?hey know what they are getting into, so they shouldn’t be surprised if things go wrong!

Many of those who have been criminally negligent and actively opposed best safety standards do not consider that they are doing anything illegal.

One glaring example is the attitudes of employers in the asbestos mining, processing and transport industries. The worst example was of course James Hardie was the worst example. Matt Peacock’s 2009 well researched book, Killer Company James Hardie Exposed, gives a detailed account of this company’s criminal behaviour which has contributed substantially to the fact that tens of thousands of Australian workers are dying well before they should be and they are suffering dreadfully painful deaths.

Workers and members of the public were lied to about the dangers asbestos and true nature of their medical conditions. There were attempts by the employer to delay court actions in the hope that the victims would die before receiving their compensation. James Hardie tried to relocate overseas and leave insufficient monies for compensation.

Of course, there is a double standard here. The same principles do no apply to negligent drivers on our roads. They meet the full force of law if their negligence injures or kills others. And this should be the case.

ACCI (the Australian Council of Commerce and Industry), the peak employer body in Australia resists the introduction of effective new codes arguing that there are too many OHS&W laws. In 2005, ACCI published a Modern Workplace: Safer Workplace Blueprint for Improving OHS. Much of it was a complaint about Australia’s OHS&W laws and expressed the desire to have less legislation and opposed the introduction of any laws including Industrial Manslaughter (more about that later).

It released the document on 28 April, IWMD, the very day that millions around the world were involved in ceremonies to remember workers, friends and loved-ones who had died or suffered in the workplace.

On one hand, Australia’s OHS&W laws need to be uniform in all states, but they also need to be effective and they need to be adequately enforced.

Many employers promote the concept of behavioural safety. This approach to OHS&W relies on constantly monitoring the safety performance of employees and does not concentrate on the insistence that employers provide safe and healthy workplaces. Those pushing this philosophy tend to blame the workers for accidents, injury and disease

Humphrey McQueen describes many of these attitudes in Framework of Flesh.

A young Adelaide apprentice, Daniel Madeley, died in April 2004 after his dustcoat caught in an unguarded horizontal boring machine at Diemould Tooling Services, dragging him into a gigantic drill and flinging him around causing horrific injuries.

A spokesperson for the company stated in court that the company owner at the time of the accident was someone who regarded safety improvements as a bit unnecessary! The company was fined $72,000 for breaches of SA’s OHS&W regulations.

WorkChoices

Most would agree that the major reason why the Howard Government was defeated at the 2007 federal elections was the issue of WorkChoices. The Australian trade union movement mounted a very costly, spectacular and effective campaign in the lead up to that election and that was a major factor in the Howard defeat.

The ALP promised to overturn WorkChoices, abolish the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) and do something about unifying and extending Australia’s OHS&W laws.

The ABCC

The ABCC was created by the Howard Government to put pressure on the CFMEU just as it saided and abetted the actions of Patricks against the MUA in 1998. The ABCC is an anachronistic body which has been given strong arbitrary powers to impose intolerable control over the industrial and OH&S activities of construction workers. Howard sought to create a situation where building and construction workers would be blocked from demanding safe working conditions, which many construction employers did not want to pay.

Ark Tribe, a construction worker in SA, faces 6 months gaol because he held meetings to address OH&S issues at his worksite at Flinders Medical Centre and refused to give details of that meeting to the ABCC .

A political party claiming to support workers would have abolished such a body in its first week of office just as Whitlam abolished the National Service Act in 1972.

The existence of such a body should not be happening in a civilised country in the 21st century.

The campaign to abolish the ABCC and prevent Ark Tribe from going to gaol is a very important one, but I believe that it should be seen in the context of the present threat to our OHS&W laws during the process of harmonisation.

“Harmonisationof OH&S Laws

Arising from the promises of the 2007 election promises, the Rudd and Gillard Governments have been standardising our OH&S laws in the nation in an exercise that began in 2008. Many unionists involved in OHS&W wanted to avoid the use of the word harmonisation as it was a term used by the Howard Government and most workers did not trust a process to merge our OHS&W laws if Howard or Abbott were in control of the process.

The unifying of the laws is something that OHS&W activists in the Australian union movement have been demanding for a period of over 2 decades. During that time, the union OHS&W activists have always argued that national uniform OHS&W laws effectively protect workers and that they should be effectively enforced.

It  would be a good thing if the harmonisation process was leading to best practice legislation with effective enforcement. The fact is, however, that what we are going to get will be seriously watered down OH&S laws, which could lead to even higher levels of work-related disease, accidents and death.

Of particular concern is the fact that existing asbestos codes and regulations will become less stringent. Exposure to asbestos dust is currently the biggest killer of Australian workers.

NSW OH&S legislation allows for unions in that state to initiate prosecution of employers alleged to be criminally negligent. This will not be retained in the new national laws. There are many other changes which will make it more difficult for Health & Safety Representatives (H&SRs) to play the role that they can in SA and other states to protect the health and safety of fellow workers.

It is obvious that the outcome will be disastrous for Australian workers.

The ACTU Leadership & Attitudes to OHS&W

The ACTU leadership over the years claims that OHS&W is a major issue, however, the action to demonstrate this commitment has not always been very strong. When I first got involved with the ACTU OH&S Committee in the late 1980s, it met once every 2 years. A number of activists managed to change this so that it was gradually increased to 4 times a year which is still the case.

The ACTU Assistant Secretary responsible for OHS&W when I first was first on the Committee basically expected to tell the committee members about OHS&W issues and did not want delegate feedback. It was quite a struggle to get motions put, carried and then actioned. I don’t think he understood that unions are actually supposed to be democratic!

At that time, the ACTU was generally way behind the latest thinking in preventive strategies. For example, when most modern manual handling codes had already ruled out weight limits for workers and were promoting the concept of no worker should lift a weight beyond which s/he was able to manage and engineering solutions to MH problems, this ACTU assistant secretary was still pushing for weight limits.

Further, the welfare aspect of OHS&W was considered to be a joke. Once, when we were considering an ACTU recommended accident/injury report form, I noticed that amongst the multiple choice boxes on the draft form, there were none asking injured workers about psychological injuries. I did not get much support for this position then, but now, nobody but the worst employers, ACCI (the Australian Council of Commerce and Industry), the peak employer body in Australia resists the introduction of effective new codes arguing that there are too many OHS&W laws.

Most unions have workers’ compensation officers or hire experienced lawyers to assist their members with workers compensation claims. However, very few have specialist OH&S officers to promte prevention and assist members in their struggles for safer and healthier workplaces.

In the late 1990s, the ACTU initiated a new program called Organising Works to address the issue of declining union membership and to promote improved grass root actions in more workplace to resolve industrial issues. Organising Works was brilliant except that one of the program’s key trainers promoted the idea that unions did not need specialist OH&S officers. As a result, one union secretary in SA who is now a parlamentarian abolished the OH&S officer position in his union. Quite appropriately, there was a great member backlash, but the position was not replaced

ACTU OH&S Unit

In 1981, Dr John Matthews was the founding leader of the ACTU-Victorian Trades Hall Council OH&S Unit. Over the years, this unit has assisted large numbers of union activists on OHS&W matters and represented the union movement in trying to achieve best practice OHS&W codes and laws.

During then time of the National OH&S Commission, the ACTU and ACCI (the Australian Council of Commerce and Industry), the peak employer body, received grants to employ a number of staff in their respective organisations.

For a number of years, from the late 1990s to about 2005, the ACTU employed 3 well qualified and experienced staff in this unit. This dedicated group of people were involved in negotiating with the NOHSC and other agencies preparing national codes, working on the ACTU OH&S Committee papers, assisting union leaders activists with expert advice, organising OHS&W campaigns every year to coincide with IWMD and union OH&S conferences and providing up to date OHS&W information to the union movement.

Sadly, they were basically stampeded out of the unit in 2005 by Richard Marles, an ACTU assistant secretary who is now a federal parliamentarian. They were replaced with one officer.

The person appointed was Steve Mullins who did not have experience in OHS&W, but worked extremely hard to get control of the job. He achieved much, but obviously could not match the achievements of the 3 officers who preceded him.

OHS&W & Elections

The ACTU usually goes into overdrive when there are federal or state elections to promote current union campaigns.When I was a member of the ACTU OH&S Committee in 2006, I successfully moved a motion that OHS&W be a major component of the ACTU Your Rights at Work Campaign which was a major reason for the defeat of the Howard Government at the 2007 elections.

Also, just prior to the elections, the ACTU OH&S Committee finalised the Union Charter of Workplace Rights for OHS & Workers’ Compensation. This statement was seen as a very important document by the union movement as it assumed that workers have a basic human right to have the best OHS&W conditions in their workplaces, effective legislation and strong enforcement of it and adequate compensation if they still became injured or diseased.

The ACTU OH&S Committee recommended that the Charter be used as an election tool and to call on activists to ask candidates to commit to it during the campaign in the lead up to the 2007 election.

Sadly the issue of OHS&W was not central to that campaign. Basically, any mention of OHS&W was left to that courageous worker, Bernie Banton, who was terminally ill because he was in the final stages of mesothelioma. Bernie took on former Health Minister Tony Abbott to have the drug, Alimta, made available on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme to mesothelioma sufferers. This drug helps to alleviate the symptoms of cancer and prolongs life and was available for sufferers of ordinary lung cancer, but not mesothelioma of the lung. Abbott was not going to give in, but changed his mind just before the 2007 election thanks to the actions of Bernie and some very callous remarks made by Abbott.

To be fair, former ACTU Secretary, Greg Combet, also accompanied Bernie Banton in court appearances to ensure that asbestos victims received more adequate compensation than what the James Hardie corporation was originally prepared to give. This battle also proved victorious.

Some unions did promote the Charter, but it was not promoted by the ACTU leadership. Indeed, during this time, it was very difficult for many union members to find it on the ACTU website.

It should be noted that Greg Combet, the former ACTU secretary was one of a number of union leaders who successfully entered Federal Parliament in 2007. Union activists might well ask what are these MHRs and senators doing to ensure we get the most effective OHS&W laws?

Then Deputy PM Julia Gillard, addressed the 2008 ACTU OH&S Conference in Melbourne. I asked her if she would personally commit to the Charter. Her response was that she would not do so as she had not seen it. Steve Mullins told me that her had given it to her personally.

At the 2009 ACTU OH&S Conference in Sydney, the delegates carried a resolution urging the ACTU Executive to organise a campaign to promote OHS&W that would be as well resourced as the Your Rights at Work Campaign (YRWC). In response, the ACTU initiated a campaign entitled DON’T RISK 2ND RATE SAFETY (DRSRS) which is supposed to pressure the Government to introduce effective laws which will be effectively enforced.

The leadership activity around this campaign is so low that many key union members do not know of its existence.  At an Ark Tribe rally in 2009, I worked with a group of comrades to encourage the several thousand present ro sign a petition for the DRSRS Campaign. Out of several hundred activists attending the rally I spoke to not one knew that the ACTU even had a campaign!

The union movement in Australia is very fortunate that the Victorian Trades Hall Council (VTHC) OH&S Unit exists because it has done a great job in providing OHS&W resources to assist the ACTU during the harmonisation exercise as well as promoting the important ongoing OHS&W campaigns.

Zero Occupational Cancer Campaign (ZOCC)

This campaign organised by the ITUC should have provided a great opportunity for the union movement in Australia to educate the public about work-related cancers. Cancer is the biggest killer of workers world-wide and in Australia, the asbestos-related cancers are the ones that claim most workers’ lives.

In 2008, the ACTU OH&S Unit organised a one day briefing for union officials. About 30 attended and most were officers responsible for OHS&W. At this day, there was agreement that the union movement would make this a large campaign that would involve grass-root union activists across the nation. It was also agreed that there would be a national conference inolving unions, researchers, cancer councils, cancer sufferers and the wider community.

In late 2009, there was a successful one day conference, kNOw Cancer in the Workplace Conference, which involved the Australian Cancer Council. The papers can be found on the Cancer Council’s website, but not on the ACTU’s.

ZOCC was picked up more energetically by the Victorian Trades Hall Council (VTHC) OH&S Unit, which organised a number of events and carried a lot of information on its website.. A few unions independently organised their own events and carried information on their websites eg AMWU, AEU, PSA/CPSU . In South Australia, the PSA/CPSU and SA Unions held half day seminars during SafeWork SA’s Safe Work Month in 2008.

It is interesting to compare what happened during this campaign in other parts of the world. As I mentioned earlier, the campaign continued for about 5 years internationally. The Canadian Auto Workers prepared a manual for its members, which explained how cancers are formed, what chemicals and other agents cause them, suggested actions to identify carcinogens in workplaces and to have them replaced with safer products. There were goals to drastically reduce the number of carcinogenic agents used in workplaces world-wide and to achieve an international ban on asbestos.

Britain’s Hazards Magazine repeatedly included information about the campaign. The International . The International Metalworkers Federation prepared a very informative booklet, which was used by its affiliates and other unions around the world.

The issue of occupational cancer is a big one in this country and the ACTU leadership should have shown greater leadership to ensure that ZOCC continued for a longer time and reached many more Australian workers than it did.

Why OHS&W is not deemed as a major issue by the ALP & some union leaders

OHS&W is one of the great issues that the progressive movement needs to adopt far more strongly than it has in the past. ALP governments are not willing to push this issue as strongly as they should if ithey were truly supporting the Australian working class.

This also affects the ACTU as many of its leaders eventually become ALP MPs and they do not want to take stands that are likely to get them off side with the conservative elements in ACCI and the ALP.

ACCI representatives almost always push for OHS&W codes that are not effective and certainly oppose the introduction of Industrial Manslaughter Legislation. Such legislation would ensure that negligent employers whose negligence leads to death, serious injury or disease would personally be liable to be fined and/or serve prison terms.

The only ALP government in Australia to support such legislation is the ACT government.

This is the reason why progressive unionists and activists need to be active in promoting OHS&W

I thought it was amazing that the Federal Government was so inept in defending itself during the public debate over the tragic deaths of the insulation workers while carrying out installation work as part of the Federal Government home insulation program. virtually accused Peter Garrett of industrial manslaughter.  

Government members could have pointed out that, in every state and territory of Australia, there are already OHS&W laws that require employers to undergo a risk assessment procedure and to provide their employees with adequate training in safe work procedures

before any work begins and to ensure that there is effective supervision. Further, all employers have a duty to provide healthy and safe workplaces and to provide employees with safe equipment and materials to carry out their work safely. Each state and territory have inspectorates to ensure that these laws are adhered to.

Deputy PM, Julia Gillard, was correct when she stated that Peter Garrett cannot be in every roof while the insulation is being installed. However, if it is true he knew that there were poor safety standards involved at the beginning of the program, the responsible course of action on his part would have been to liaise with OH&S authorities around the country to ensure that all involved in the program were trained and were provided with safe systems of work, safe equipment and effective safeguards before the work commenced. Further, inspectorates should have been monitoring the program closely to ensure that safety standards were not being breached.

 Those workers died because there were failures on the part of many key players.

During the public debate, Tony Abbott tried to accuse Peter Garrett of industrial manslaughter. This is interesting because the Liberal and National parties have always opposed the introduction of industrial manslaughter legislation. The only government that has such legislation is the ACT. There have also been attempts to introduce this type of legislation in NSW, Victoria ans SA, but other ALP governments do not want to introduce such legislation either largely because of the reaction by the big employers.

If people who drive in a negligent manner kill or maim others, they expect heavy fines and prison terms. Why should this not the case for negligent employers who through their negligence kill or maim employees? This should be an integral part of an effective OH&S legal system. As I write, the local daily paper, The Advertiser, ran two stories one about a young person driving in a dangerous manner and the other about an industrial death on the desalination plant at Port Stanvac. The first story was on page 3 even though no-one was hurt; the report of the industrial death appeared on page12!

Having worked in the union movement for about 25 years, I know that many union leaders including those in the ALP do not give much priority to OHS&W. For some of those who want to enter parliament, I am sure that there is the consideration of not wanting to get big interests off side, but for many others, they just don’t understand.

This is the challenge. As we struggle to make changes for a safer and healthier future, we need to change

Conclusion

It is my view that all progressive, green and social justice activists should strongly support the campaign to abolish the ABCC and to prevent Ark Tribe from going to prison. However, the ever present issue is the demand for OHS&W codes and laws that protect workers from injury, disease and death.

OUR OHS&W RIGHTS AT WORK ARE WORTH FIGHTING & VOTING FOR TOO!

DON’T RISK 2ND RATE SAFETY!

DON’T RISK 2ND RATE OHS&W CAMPAIGNS!

Andy Alcock

SUGGESTED READING

I would urge all progressive activists to read the 2 books listed below as they describe the tragic situations that have been allowed to occur in Australian workplaces because of inadequate OHS&W laws and lack of effective enforcement of the laws that we have.

Humphrey McQueen: Framework of Flesh – Builders’ Labourers Battle for

Health & Safety (Ginninderra Press)

Matt Peacock: Killer Company (ABC Books)

MESSAGE TO ARK TRIBE

5/11/09 10:09

“Many workers around the country are watching your case with great interest because your courageous stand is about workers’ basic human rights to work in a healthy and safe environment.

As the ABCC tries to bully you and fellow construction workers into not organising over this crucial issue, the Gillard-Rudd government is embarked on watering down our OHS&W laws in Australia.

The struggle to resist this move by the pseudo Rudd Labor government must be resisted as we fight to remove the ABCC. In 2007, the ACTU published a Charter of Workers OH&S Rights. This is based on the UN Charter of Human Rights, but is widened to include the important principles of best practice OH&S & Workers’ Comp & Rehabilitation laws that are needed to achieve the basic human right for workers to be healthy and safe at work. It is important that all rallies to support you demand that our political leaders commit to this Charter and ensure that our national OH&S laws are very strong and not weak as could be the case. All progressive workers and Australian citizens are with you, Ark, as they keep dragging you into court hearing after court hearing. See you in December outside the Adelaide Magistrates’ Court.

A la lucha continua!

Venceremos!

Andy Alcock

former union OH&S officer & human rights activist”

As a person  who has worked in the area of occupational health and safety (OH&S), I was distressed to read David Smith’s article, Miners sue gold giant Anglo for lung disease payout (TGW 27.11.09).

Tragically, all too often in the history of work, those who seek to make huge profits out of the work of others refuse to implement effective safeguards, claiming them to be too expensive. Later, when it is realised that huge numbers of workers are suffering incurable diseases or are dying far too early, many owners of industry deny there is a problem and then fight paying compensation to the victims of their criminal negligence. They can get away with this behaviour because OH&S laws are weak or absent.

In the case of Anglo miners, the problem is silicosis, a dusty lung disease. In Australia, the major killer of workers are diseases caused from exposure to asbestos dust. The diseases are asbestosis, a dusty lung disease, lung cancer and mesothelioma, cancer that develops in the lining of the lungs.

Workers in Australia have had a long struggle to get compensation from the companies that have caused their diseases and death. The most notorious is James Hardie, a company which produced asbestos products for several decades in Australia. It lied and deceived about the dangers of asbestos dust exposure and then tried to cheat victims out of their compensation. Finally, it tried to shirk its responsibilities by going offshore to the Netherlands and leaving a woefully inadequate compensation fund.  After much campaigning by victims and the Australian Council of Trade Unions, the James Hardie company has been forced by law to give compensation to its former employees.

Not one of its senior executives has been brought to justice for the crimes they have committed against humanity, even though there are tens of thousands of victims who are dying earlier than expected. Tragically, stories like this are being repeated in many parts of the world including South Africa as David Smith’s story reveals.

Effective OH&S laws could help to prevent these tragic outcomes, but politicians have to be pushed into taking action.

The International Labour Organisation (ILO) estimates that every year in the world, about 2.2 million workers die from work-related causes and that a 160 million more become sick or injured. More people die from work related causes than from wars. This is a deplorable situation which needs to be changed urgently.

The majority victims are dying from work related cancers caused by carcinogenic chemicals or agents. As a result, the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) has had a cancer awareness campaign to alert workers to the dangers. All governments should be supporting the ITUC campaign and tightening OH&S laws to protect their working people from all workplace hazards and from owned criminally negligent employers.

Effective OH&S is a basic human right for all workers. Every worker has the right to return home at the end of the working day, healthy and safe. At the end of a working life, every worker should have the right to enjoy a long, happy and healthy retirement.

Currenly the Australian Government is standardising OH&S legislation in the country. Sadly for Australian workers, it is watering down the laws we currently have. This will inevitably lead to more work related disease, injuries and deaths.

I was very interested to read Hendrik Gout’s article about SA’s Deputy Premier and his battle with depression (A Man and His Reasons, TIW 13-19.11.2009).

I agree that there should be a great deal of compassion and empathy shown for any person with this condition.

As Hendrik pointed out, Kevin Foley is known for putting his views in a very strong and forthright manner and frequently displays aggressive behaviour and anger towards those with whom he disagrees. Evidently, these displays of temper are not necessarily related to his depression.

It has to be said that our Deputy Premier is not known for displaying empathy or compassion towards others including those who need it.

As people show some feelings of sympathy towards him because of his condition, it is to be hoped that in return, he will develop greater feelings of sympathy and compassion towards others who may experience misfortune. A sympathetic review of compensation for injured workers, which was cut back in 2008, would be a worthy starting point.