politics – Page 163 – SafetyAtWorkBlog

Asbestos is an example of immoral economic growth

The financial newspapers often refere to a BRIC group of countries or, rather, economies. This stands for Brazil, Russia, India and China and is used to describe the forecasted economic powerhouses for this century. But there is also the risk of economic growth without morality. India is a case in point and asbestos can be an example.

The health hazards of asbestos have been established for decades but only officially acknowledged more recently. One would expect that when some countries ban the import, export and manufacture of a product that other countries may suspect that something may be amiss.

In the introduction to the September 2008 book “India’s Asbestos Time Bomb” Laurie Kazan-Allen writes

“Historically the burden of industrial pollution has reached the developing world much faster than the fruits of industrial growth” writes Dr. Sanjay Chaturvedi. This statement is well illustrated by the evolution of the asbestos industry in India. In the frantic rush for economic development, there has been a pervasive lack of concern for the health of workers and the contamination of the environment. Sacrificing the lives of the few for the “good” of the many, the Indian Government has knowingly colluded in this sad state of affairs.”

Kazan-Allen is a longtime campaigner on asbestos. In 2001 she put this question to the Canadian Medical Association Journal.

“Chrysotile has caused and is continuing to cause disease and death worldwide. It is hypocritical for Canada to continue to produce chrysotile when it is not prepared to use it domestically. If chrysotile is unsuitable for Canadian lungs, how does it become suitable for Korean, Indian and Japanese lungs?”

A foundation of public health and workplace safety management is that bad practices, immoral practices, are corrected, not accommodated. At some point the exploitation of others for the financial betterment of a few must end. Could that lead to a “compassionate capitalism” or is that just another term for “socialism”? These semantics are being argued at the moment in the United States over health care but the question needs to be asked globally, just as it is on climate change and on the financial markets.

The global implications of poor OHS management and practices needs to be placed on the policy agenda not only of the ILO, United Nations and trade union movement, but the business groups, and professional associations who need to develop their social charters. If those voices are not added to the debate, safety will also be a fringe issue and it is too important for that.

Kevin Jones

Gov’t responds to insulation installer’s death

Recently SafetyAtWorkBlog reported of the death of a worker installing insulation in a domestic home. A staple for the foil insulation apparently pierced an electrical cable and electrocuted the worker.

The Queensland Government has introduced mandatory provisions to avoid the hazard in the future. In a media release on 1 November 2009, the Industrial Relation Minister, Cameron Dick,

“… issued a ministerial notice under the Electrical Safety Act 2002 to prohibit the use of metal fastenings for ceiling insulation.”

The ban is effective from 1 November 2009.

It may already be the case, elsewhere in the world, that non-conductive fasteners are used for installing metallic insulation. If not, the rules introduced by the government should prove useful references.

“The ministerial notice means that installers will have to use nylon or plastic fasteners (which are already in use within the industry), glue or tape to fix foil insulation in ceilings.

As well as banning metal fasteners, the notice also:

forces insulation installers to comply with the Wiring Rules with respect to the placement of any type of insulation near recessed downlights

makes electrical safety risk assessment training mandatory for all installers

forces installers to document their on-site electrical safety risk assessments and keep a record f or five years.”

Such a mandatory rule is clearly a necessary short-term fix but it does little to address the concerns of the Master Electricians Association. Training and enforcement are the long-term solutions but policymakers must also anticipate the applications of their policies more closely. New policies should not be announced in an industry that does not have the resources to meet the policy’s aims.

Kevin Jones

Senator calls for Senate hearing on the safety of posties

Senator Steve Fielding is the head of the Family First Party, the smallest political party in Australia’s Parliament at the moment. Fielding is one of the handful of senators who hold the balance of power in the parliament and therefore has more political influence than a party of the size of Family First usually has.

On 19 October 2009, as a result of evidence given at a Senate inquiry by a representative of Australia Post, Senator Fielding said, in a media statement:

“There are serious allegations staff have been forced back to work simply to sit in a room to watch television so managers can get their bonus for having lower lost injury time figures,” Senator Fielding said. “This is outrageous and puts the health of workers at risk because of some greedy managers.

“No wonder Australia Post won an award last month for its rehabilitation of injured workers if it’s fudging the numbers. There’s an obvious conflict of interest between InjuryNET, which looks after the doctors that Australia Post sends its workers too, and Australia Post itself.

“Dr David Milecki, who is a consultant to Australia Post’s return-to-work program, also runs InjuryNET.

“Australia Post even admitted that this contract did not go through an independent process – there was not even a tender process.

“We need a senate inquiry urgently to make sure Australia Post employees are being looked after and that they’re aren’t being taken advantage of by dodgy managers who are more interested in their bonuses.”

SafetyAtWorkBlog contacted Australia Post to gauge some reaction. A spokesperson says that Australia Post will be cooperating fully with any Senate inquiry.

Every country has its fair share of eccentric politicians. The current feeling is that Steve Fielding is Australia’s. But regardless of character or competence, the Senator has authority and a responsibility to investigate the concerns listed above.

This is a developing story but one that may relate a little to issues raised in the recent SafetyAtWorkBlog about awards nights.

Kevin Jones

Asbestos and corruption as a case study

Australia has been a major supplier of asbestos to the world for decades. It has also been a major corporate beneficiary of the revenue for the sale of this poisonous material.

The latest situation in Melbourne is a good example of all that is wrong with asbestos and worker exposure. According to reports in The Age newspapers in late October 2009, a property developer has allegedly offered $A57,000 to a safety officer on a hospital redevelopment project, allegedly, in order to turn a blind eye to the issue of asbestos at the site. According to the newspaper reports, some in the industry have described this payment as a bribe.

In February 2006, the developer received a report from an independent consultant advising that asbestos be removed prior to demolition. The developer removed most but not all. It is in this patch of remaining asbestos that two workers dug through the concrete with a jack hammer and concrete saw, generating considerable dust from the concrete and the asbestos. The workers were not wearing any protective masks.

Australia is dealing with the corporate immorality of James Hardie Industries, although there is much more that can be down. Wittenoom is closed and has almost disappeared. Companies are required to have an asbestos register for their properties. Tasmania is to become free of asbestos by 2020. There is a lot of activity, so much that the control of this poisonous material should not be handled in an ad hoc manner. Governmental vision is required to commit to the removal of asbestos and the clean-up of contaminated sites.

It is an easy moral call for governments – the toxicity of asbestos is indisputable, the public health risks are known. But it will cost. Governments are in a similar bind as with climate change policy – decades of prosperity at the same time as not considering the health legacy of that wealth.

There is no such thing as an emissions trading scheme for asbestos. It is suspected that, if at all, the government will need to apply surcharges or tax incentives for companies to support any initiative. This always flows back to the consumers paying ultimately. Anti-asbestos advocates can rightly feel angry at the fact that companies have benefited greatly from knowingly selling a toxic material, and the same companies are likely to benefit again through the clean-up. This may simply be the price we must pay for living in a society based on capitalism. God help the new “capitalist” nations like China.

Kevin Jones

SafetyAtWorkBlog hopes to finalise a podcast with journalist and author, Matt Peacock, by the end of this week. Peacock is the author of Killer Company

Nice comparison on Directors’ complaints

In the Australian Financial Review in October 2009 there was an opinion piece (not available online) from the CEO of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD), John Colvin, expressing concerns about the accountability of directors under legislation including the proposed OHS laws in Australia.

According to a report by Adam Schwab in the Crikey newsletter of 23 October 2009 (also not freely available online), Colvin wrote in the AFR:

“There are more than 660 state and territory laws which impose personal liability on individual directors for corporate misconduct. That is, a director is liable because he is a director, even when he may not have had any personal involvement in the breach…”

Schwab writes

“The AICD noted, the NSW courts have taken a hard-line enforcing the deemed liability laws. According to AICD data, between 2004 and 2008, 144 company directors were found guilty of OHS offences, of which 115 of those prosecutions occurred in NSW.”

Schwab then provides a comparison of risk that I wish I’d thought of:

“That means the proportion of directors convicted over these so-called onerous laws is 0.0068%. To compare, there is roughly a 0.04% chance of someone being struck by lightning. Therefore, based on the AICD’s own data, company directors are six times more likely to be hit by lightning than to be prosecuted. It also shouldn’t be forgotten, directors’ liabilities are almost always covered by indemnity insurance and most prosecutions result in a mere financial penalty.

While the NSW OHS laws result in occasional harsh results, to extrapolate one set of allegedly ill-advised laws across the country is much like a cry of wolf.”

This perspective will be an important one to remember when considering the submissions being lodged with Safe Work Australia on the OHS model laws by 9 November 2009. The corporate submissions particularly but also those from the OHS law firms that spruiker the exposure of company directors ruthlessly whenever OHS and accountability is discussed.

Some of us remember the “glory days” when industrial manslaughter was widely considered in some Australian States. (There is a noticeable absence of controversy of the industrial manslaughter law that is operating in the Australian Capital Territory)

Also important is the point that Schwab makes about indemnity insurance for Directors and Officers, a matter that has been discussed elsewhere in SafetyAtWorkBlog.

The amount of “get-out-jail-free” options available for directors should encourage more attention to alternative, non-financial penalties for breaches of OHS law. Over the last 24 hours the United States has been talking about replacing executive cash remunerations with stocks so that director’s incomes are reliant on the share price of the corporation which, in turn, relates to the quality of leadership from the director.

As long as Australia’s principle OHS penalties involve money, directors can buy their way out of trouble. If Australia’s Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, can face an entire country and apologise for the bad behaviour of others, and the bad policies of other governments in relation to the interaction with indigenous peoples, why should company directors not have a similar obligation when their poor management of a workplace kills someone? If corporate executives are that keen on leadership, let’s see them apply some of the leadership that Rudd showed, and accept responsibility when they should.

Kevin Jones

A consistent approach to developing public policy is required

Australia is a Federation of States. This does not just mean that each State is a different colour of the schoolroom map. Each State has its own duties to its citizens from within the overall scheme of running a country.

There has always been a tension between the two levels of government and currently the management of health care facilities is the cause of friction, as reported, for instance, in The Age newspaper on 23 October 2009. The current tension in this sector illustrates a trend that extends beyond health and into workplace safety legislation, human resources and social policy.

The Victorian Health Minister, Daniel Andrews, is reported to have said that Canberra’s “health bureaucrats [are] remote and incapable of understanding the day-to-day needs of patients.”

“”You can never take it as a given that decision makers and policy makers at the bureaucratic level in Canberra understand how you deliver care in a bed, in a ward or in a country town, because they don’t do that: it’s not their world.”

This argument echoes some of the concerns being raised over the national harmonisation of OHS laws. In such a large country as Australia there are going to be cultural, demographic and geographical variations that a centralised system cannot service. The Federal Government is hoping to harmonise workplace safety but it has already taken over industrial relations and is strongly threatening a takeover of health. Why the inconsistency?

On 22 October 2009 at the HR Leadership Awards ceremony in Melbourne, the CEO of Carnival, Ann Sherry, said that centralised policy makers in Canberra are making important decisions from within a rarified world. Sherry is a member of a review panel into the Australian Public Service (APS) and she identified several features of the APS, and shortcomings, as the service aims to become “world’s best practice in public administration”. Amongst them:

42% of public servants are younger than 45 years;
a highly educated workforce;
senior public service positions are centered in Canberra.

The last characteristic Sherry said has led to a disconnection between service design and delivery, echoing, to some extent, the concerns of Daniel Andrews on health policy.

It seems that there are many reviews and investigations occurring into how various industries and sectors in Australian business and government should be structured for the future, a future that is likely to be very different, climatically, economically and demographically. But there is not a consistency in approaches, or at least one that is readily understood, even though the Australian Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, talks repeatedly about “nation building“.

The Australian Government has the best chance in a long time to set the country on a path of sustainable growth. The United States, under President Barack Obama, has a similar opportunity. Governments have an obligation to plan for the long-term benefit of their countries ands citizens, not the short-term gains of their political donors, political parties and lobbyists. This obligation is as relevant in occupational health and safety as it is anywhere.

Kevin Jones

Unintended consequences of inadequate preparation

The Australian Government instigated a rebate scheme for ceiling insulation for domestic homes in order to the climatic impacts of heating one’s home. The rebates effectively make insulation free and, as a result, there is a boom in insulation installation.

As with any boom in any industry, there is an influx of new workers. The Australian newspaper reports the death of an installer in Brisbane in mid-October 2009 and the shortcomings this death illustrates.

The article says that the rebate scheme has been so popular that fibreglass batts are not available so installers are using foil-based reflective insulation.

“Master Electricians Association president Malcolm Richards said the foil-based products should be banned in established homes because untrained installers were stapling foil on to live electricity wires. He said the practice was the cause of last week’s tragedy in Brisbane and electricians were being increasingly called on to repair dodgy work.”

Firstly, electricians are always being called on to repair the botched electrical work of others. Secondly, it’s not the fault of the foil suppliers so it seems unfair to ban a legitimate insulation product.

The Master Electricians Association is facing the problem that others face every day, unqualified workers doing the work normally undertaken by qualified workers.

The political opportunism by some in this article is regrettable.

The Australian Government should have learnt from its computers-in-schools initiative/debacle that there are ancillary costs with any government program and that these costs should be considered in the policy development and/or have relevant organisations consulted so that the necessary support services are prepared for the plan’s launch and operation.

The computers-in-schools program did not consider the software costs to use on the free computer for ever secondary school student. The LPG conversion rebate did not consider the scale of demand. The solar panel rebate scheme was cancelled even though the demand was great. The home insulation scheme has drawn inexperienced installers into the industry. All good intentions harmed through poor planning and some of that harm can be the death of workers.

Kevin Jones

Category: politics

Asbestos is an example of immoral economic growth

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Gov’t responds to insulation installer’s death

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Senator calls for Senate hearing on the safety of posties

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Asbestos and corruption as a case study

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Nice comparison on Directors’ complaints

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A consistent approach to developing public policy is required

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Unintended consequences of inadequate preparation

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