politics – Page 173 – SafetyAtWorkBlog

The value of brevity in government submissions and business reports

In Australia, at the moment, there are several governmental inquiries that could involve safety management issues. Submissions to inquiries can often be bloated with information that a review panel already knows or can be off topic. Frequently, relevant but not essential information is included in the body of the submission where it could be just as easily included in an appendix.

Past experience in handling Cabinet submissions has indicated that a brief listing of the recommendations or requests is best, as this makes it much easier for the review panels to digest. People tend to forget that their submission is going to be one of, perhaps, hundreds, and that brevity is highly valued in the public service (except perhaps in their own publications and reports?).

This position on brevity is one that should also be applied to client reports concerning workplace safety. Many consultants forget that their clients are already very familiar with their own workplace and don’t need to be shown “how to suck eggs”.

Kevin Jones

How Workers’ Memorial Day should be treated

For the first time in many years, I will not be able to attend the local service for the Workers’ Memorial Day on 28 April 2009. I will be attending the Safe Work Australia Awards in Canberra which, coincidentally, is on the same day. I hope that the award ceremony includes a minute’s silence to remember those who have died at work.

Recently the San Francisco Labor Council passed a resolution in support of Workers’ Memorial Day. It provided several good reasons why trade unionists and, I would say, OHS professionals, should support this day. Below is part of the resolution

Whereas, April 28, 2009 is an international day of commemoration for injured workers and workers killed on the job; and

Whereas, the elimination of all doctors at Ca-OSHA has threatened the health and safety protection of California’s 17 million workers; and

Whereas, the introduction of new technology such as biotech and nanotechnology without proper oversight can and has become a threat to workers and our communities; and

Whereas, the deregulation of workers compensation has harmed injured workers and their families in California and throughout the country; and

Whereas, many of these workers have been forced onto SSI, Disability Insurance and other state and local agencies to cover their healthcare costs which is cost-shifting; and

Whereas, senior workers in many industries have been forced into retirement due to their disabilities on the job and discrimination against them due to their disabilities and age including at the US Post Office and other industries; and

Whereas, all working people and their families whether working or injured are entitled to full healthcare,

Therefore be it resolved the San Francisco Labor Council endorses and supports a Workers Memorial Day event on April 28, 2009 in San Francisco at ILWU Local 34 and encourages it’s affiliates to publicize and participate in this California Coalition for Workers Memorial Day (CCWMD)

It is a lesson for other unions and organisations that such a day does not deal with localised industrial relations disputes and can be a platform for improvement in the quality of life of workers by calling for

increased enforcement and policy resources;
caution over emerging hazards;
reassessment of deregulation;
insurance and healthcare improvements; and
appealing early retirements due to illness and injury.

I urge OHS professionals to seek out your local commemorations and participate. The more people attend, the more government will realise the seriousness of the issue. More importantly, the services remind us why we entered this profession in the first place and, just maybe, how we have made a difference.

Kevin Jones

Migrant worker safety

Recently one of the Australian boutique labour law firms ran a seminar on employment issues related to migrant workers. Australia has a history of using workers from the Pacific Islands, principally, in agriculture. Chinese have been working in Australia since the goldfields of the 1800s. New Zealanders are so frequent that the countries almost share an economy in some ways. Some labour is imported, other labour is invited or sought.

The global economic problems has exacerbated the difficulties many countries face with legal and illegal migrant workers. Australia is not immune. There may be less and less water in the country, certainly in the south, but it is still considered a land of opportunity by neighbours.

Workplace safety issues are perhaps the easiest to deal with in this labour sector as the employment status is not relevant to the obligation to provide a safe and healthy work environment.

The safety training, instruction and supervision matters are similarly unaffected by employment status. However it has always been a difficult part of an OHS manager and HR manager’s job to make sure that workers understand their obligations and duties. In Victoria, one of the first OHS Codes of Practice in the 1980s concerned providing OHS information in languages other than English. It was probably the most ignored Code of Practice of all.

Recently, WorkSafe Victoria has issued Compliance Codes. Following the recommendations and techniques in these codes implies compliance and can be wonderful for the small business sector. One of the new codes is on communicating in languages other than English This is a great start but there needs a much greater effort, almost a movement, for Australia to avoid the problems facing countries like England.

In late-March 2009, the UK law firm Irwin Mitchell reported the following statistics

The report [by the Centre for Corporate Accountability], which makes the figures public for the first time and was compiled following Freedom of Information requests to the Health and Safety Executive, shows that a dozen migrant workers died in the construction industry in the year 2007/08 – at least double the figure expected and a six-fold increase in the number who died just five years earlier.

The 12 deaths comprised 17% of the total number of fatalities in the sector last year – more than double the HSE’s estimate of migrants making up around 8% of the total construction sector workforce.

Migrant deaths in other sectors is also on the increase, with the number of fatalities of non-UK workers up from nine in 2005/6 to 18 in 2007/8 and the proportion also doubling from 4.1% to 7.9% in the same period, against figures showing that 5.4% of the total workforce comprises migrants.

No official information is currently available on the level of injuries to migrant workers, as the HSE does not record nationality in injury cases, though estimates put the figure as high as 11% – again, double the expected level.

Many workplaces have already dealt with safety issues with migrant labour. Crews in rail maintenance, for instance, are often on ethical lines so that colleagues educate each other. Often workplaces call on an established worker from a specific ethnic area to take the lead in supervising others and passing on OHS information. These adhoc processes still need to be verified as effective but have worked in many workplaces for decades.

A recent rumour posted to the Australian website Crikey.com illustrates the type of attitude to migrant workers and the mixing of concerns about safety and industrial issues.

A Chinese owned mining project is advertising for a Bilingual (English Mandarin) Registered Nurse on their website [since removed]. The role is stated to be designed for liaison with Chinese workers and is required to have industrial safety knowledge, reporting directly to a company director? How many Chinese workers is this project bringing into Australia given the recent restrictions on 457s [migrant work visas], what about the requirement for foreign workers to have some competency in English, anecdotal evidence that building and construction labour rates are already decreasing and how would the unions view this approach to health and safety of foreign workers?

One OHS expert at the law firm’s seminar accepted that the language requirements were woefully inadequate and not suited for the workplace situation. It would be refreshing to see an OHS professional association begin lobbying the government on improving the language criteria for visa eligibility.

The unions would be equally concerned about the safety of any workers onsite, hopefully regardless of the workers’ union membership status.

Australia is in a lucky situation where many workplaces could continue to operate without migrant labour but the world and its economy is changing, and Australia will be dragged into the real world of the modern international workforce. It is lucky because it has the opportunity to prepare. It is such a shame that the preparation remains so thin.

Kevin Jones

Roadwork zone speed limit enforcement

At the Safety In Action Conference recently, Geoff Knox, CEO of Downer EDI spoke about the need to respect speed limits on roadwork sites. He mentioned this because his company conducts a lot of this type of work, but anyone who has driven through such a zone at the reduced speed limit sees many cars and truck travelling much faster, and only metres away from workers.

Crikey.com included a rumour in its 9 April 2009 bulletin that says on a stretch of the Monash Freeway that is being widened, that

“..within the Vic State Government that there is a tacit understanding not to police this stretch of road outside of peak hours and that between 50% & 60% of drivers are speeding. “

There are many instances where “tacit understandings” evolve into, or are considered, corruption and it is very disappointing that speed cameras, or other speed enforcement tactics, are not being applied in a circumstance where the need has never been more obvious.

Police threatened a blitz on the Monash in November 2008 if speed was not reduced.

In typical Crikey styles, there is a suggestion that there is a political advantage in this for nearby shaky electorates but the rumourmonger’s final comment brought the rumour into our context.

“Vicroads are known to be particularly concerned about worker safety, particularly at night when work is being undertaken. There is a tragedy waiting to happen, and the finger pointing after the fact will be most interesting.”

Kevin Jones

Financial dive for WorkCover NSW

SafetyAtWorkBlog recently reported on the financial results of the workers’ compensations schemes in South Australia and Victoria. WorkCover New South Wales results were released on 7 April 2009.

According to an article in the Australian Financial Review (page 4, not available on line) the WorkCover NSW fund fell by $2.3 billion – the $625 million surplus in 2007-08 has plunged to a $1.77 billion deficit.

WorkCover NSW has talked in the past about its positive achievements, and historically, they are right. In their Annual Report 2007-08, they say (page 8 )

“The WorkCover Scheme’s financial position has improved from a deficit of $3.2 billion in 2002 to a surplus of $625 million in June 2008.”

“Accentuate the positives” is the government mantra across all departments but how do you continue to do this when your funding model has collapsed. The AFR report says that Standard & Poor has estimated that this deficit represents 3% of the government’s consolidated revenue. WorkCover is just one authority that relies on stockmarket returns

The Minister, Joe Tripodi is quoted in media reports as saying that the deficit was expected and is understandable and that the workers compensation scheme is “sound”.

Richard Gilley, a risk management consultant, said that economic downturns often coincide with an increase in the “frequency and severity of claims”.

Tripodi has pledged not to increase premiums as that is the insurance cost to business, but one has to ask why not? Premiums have been reduced throughout Australia during the “good” economic times with the understanding that this would increase the profitability of business and, maybe, just maybe, provide additional funds for business to reinvest in the safety levels of the business.

Perhaps this is the wrong time to increase premiums but the question should be asked nevertheless.

It is recommended that those government authorities who accept their excessive high premiums as the cost of operating in their sector be audited and the results presented to the board and the governing authority. There are government authorities who do not recognize that the millions they pay in premiums originate from taxpayers and that, in 2008, maybe the community deserves the money that is being wasted in poorly-managed OHS and Return-To-Work systems in the public sector.

Kevin Jones

The misuse of OHS in industrial relations campaigns

Workplace safety and industrial relations are undeniably tied together in terms of policy development, legislation and implementation. This week the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) used the occupational safety record of the Australian construction industry to criticise the Australian Building & Construction Commission (ABCC).

wilcoxreportmarch2009-cover It should be stated here that SafetyAtWorkBlog does not support the ABCC. The Commission is a travesty and a political construct of the conservative side of politics. That the Rudd Labor government has allowed the Commission to persist is atrocious. However, the ABCC was established because of the perception that the Australian building and construction industry was corrupt, regardless of the absence of evidence through the Cole Royal Commission. Has the construction unions addressed this perception? No.

In the 3 April 2009 media statement issued by Dave Noonan, CFMEU Construction Division National Secretary, there are the following comments

“The right of construction workers to have a safe working environment is a glaring hole in the report. Justice Wilcox has skimmed over the issue of safety, which is a basic right of construction workers.

Safety was not part of the scope of the inquiry for Justice Wilcox. Action may have been taken by the ABCC on union representatives who were on construction sites to discuss safety but it is the presence on the site and the way that presence was achieved that is the issue, not whether the site is safe or not.

“It is shameful that the two employers used to prop up arguments for the retention of the powers of the ABCC, BHP Billiton and John Holland, have had a worker die on site in the last fortnight,” said Dave Noonan.

SafetyAtWorkBlog has elsewhere mentioned the poor safety record of BHP Billiton and the campaign on worker safety by the unions against John Holland. However, these two companies are operating within their legal rights even if one does not agree with their decisions. The focus of attention should be given to the current government which has chosen to act slowly on the ABCC, an organisation the Australian Labor Party, in opposition, opposed.

The difficulty for the union movement is that the ALP requires the ongoing support of the Australian labour movement to provide it with membership and finance (not to mention a career path for the trade union secretaries). The trade unions need the political influence of the ALP and are obliged to criticise politely but not too overtly.

“The 154 page report does not mention the safety record of the construction industry or the fact that one worker dies on average each week.”

Safety was outside Justice Wilcox’s terms of reference.

“The so called ‘industrial harmony’ brought about by the ABCC and heralded by Justice Wilcox comes at the expense of the lives of construction workers. We have deteriorating safety on construction site across Australia. At the very time Justice Wilcox was finalising his report, BHP and John Holland had a construction worker killed on their project,” said Mr Noonan.

Noonan does not offer evidence of the link between the operation of the ABCC and “deteriorating safety”. It is suspected that such research would indicate that the correlation is not that clear and that there are many other factors affecting safety management.

“Industrial harmony” is an unfair description as even totalitarian regimes can claim harmony.

“The report also fails to deal with breaches to International law by the building and construction laws. Australia has been criticised by the International Labor Organisation six times for undermining workers rights.”

This is again outside the inquiry’s scope. The ILO criticism is valid but the capacity to change is not with Justice Wilcox or the ABCC but with Australia’s politicians, who should be the union’s real targets.

“Australia’s construction unions will continue with the campaign for rights on site, using the full strength of the union movement.”

This is no more than what the union movement was established for. The union movement needs to remind itself that it is a member organisation and that worker rights are not necessarily the same as union rights. Not all union activity benefits its members.

“Workers rights to a safe workplace and equality before the law are core Labor principles. Construction workers, their unions and 10,000 working Australian’s will continue to campaign for rights on site, so all Australian worker [sic] are equal before the law,” said Mr Noonan

There are two issues here that Noonan has lumped together – workplace safety and worker equality. Regardless of union action or union presence, every Australian worker has the right to a safe and healthy work environment. Equality is harder to achieve but just as much a human right.

Above, the perception of corruption in the construction industry was mentioned. The exploitation of OHS in an industrial campaign against John Holland and the ABCC is unfair and insulting and may indicate that the union movement is not gaining traction on the industrial campaign.

It may just be that the media statement from the CFMEU is an expression of frustration and disappointment with the government that the union movement campaigned hard to bring to power and who is not providing the expected return on investment.

The union movement in Australia needs to realise that the industrial relations environment, like the upcoming OHS legislation, cannot be wound back but that a new future is possible. There is no vision in Noonan’s media statement only a complaint that the Rudd government is breaking its promise and, in the general populace, noone outside the union movement seems to care.

Kevin Jones

UPDATE ON ABCC – 6 April 2009

The Australian Greens issued a statement in early April 2009 questioning the government’s choice to retain industrial relations rules introduced by the previous, conservative, government.

Senator Rachel Siewert said

“We do not, however, support his recommendations for the separate division within the Fair Work Ombudsman to retain compulsory interrogation powers and the ability to deny workers their right to silence.”

“There is no justification to continue this discrimination against building workers. The building industry must be regulated just like any other industry – in a fair and just manner that balances the needs of productivity and the economy with the health, safety and democratic rights of workers.”

Why won’t the Tasmanian government release the OHS report into the Beaconsfield mine collapse?

Since the 2006 rockfall at Beaconsfield Mine in Tasmania, the public has received limited information. There have been books about the rescue of two workers and the Coroner’s inquest into the death of Larry Knight. Greg Mellick undertook an investigation into the rockfall and found that noone was to blame for the rockfall.

Many workplace disasters have generated royal commissions in Australia. The rockfall did not. However, industry specialists, OHS professionals and others have established an expectation that investigations and reports into industrial disasters are publicly accessible.

The expectation is not unreasonable given that the OHS profession, legal profession, engineers and others operate within a belief that the analysis of disasters can provide ways of avoiding a recurrence. Apparently the Tasmanian Government does not understand the significance of information in improving the safety of workers and the public in its State, even though its OHS and mine safety legislation is structured around prevention.

The Tasmanian Coroner released his findings into the death of Larry Knight. The findings quoted extensively from the 400+ page OHS report from Professor Michael Quinlan that was part of Greg Mellick’s investigation process. But the report itself is yet to be released. Nor has the larger report undertaken by Greg Mellick.

The Director of Public Prosecutions has chosen not to lay charges over the rockfall.

The mine is back at full operation.

The survivors of the rockfall are rebuilding their lives.

Only a couple of weeks ago, the Legislative Council Select Committee on Mining Industry Regulation released its report into the State’s mining legislation. The terms of reference have evolved from the findings of various investigations including Quinlan’s. The committee was required to investigate

Regulation and workplace standards within the mining and related industries in Tasmania.
Safety performance of the Tasmanian mining industry compared to other primary industries in the State and the mining industry nationally.
The role of Workplace Standards Tasmania in the regulation of the mining and associated industries.
The efficacy and limitations of the co-regulatory model within the mining industry in Tasmania; and
Any other matters incidental thereto.

On 2 April 2009 at the Safety In Action Conference in Melbourne, Professor Michael Quinlan expressed bewilderment at the decision to not release his investigation report.

SafetyAtWorkBlog contacted the OHS regulator in Tasmania asking for the Quinlan report. We were advised that it was likely that the only way to obtain a copy was through Freedom of Information with the Department of Premier & Cabinet. (DPAC) A representative of DPAC will contact us about the report’s status.

DPAC has a copy of the Mellick report. The Australian Workers Union has a copy of the Mellick report. SafetyAtWorkBlog believes there are leaked copies of the report in existence but for some reason, unknown at this time, the public is not permitted to see the report.

The Queensland government has available four reports into mining disasters in the Moura area with one report going back to 1972!!

In the years after the ESSO-Longford gas explosion, Professor Andrew Hopkins published “Lessons From Longford“. It was for a long time the publisher’s best-selling book. It is quoted extensively in the OHS and management professions. Some of Andrew’s terminologies and concepts of safety culture have become ingrained in the psyche of OHS professionals in Australia.

It is hard to see any reason in April 2009 for the Mellick and Quinlan reports not be be publicly available. Indeed there are many important professional and community reasons for the reports to be seen.

What is the professional legacy of the Tasmanian government’s investigations into the Beaconsfield Mine rockfall in 2004?

What will the government say when the next rockfall occurs in an underground mine? What will the Premier or the Minister say to the next generation of widows or to the carers of the crippled miners? Certainly David Bartlett or David Llewellyn cannot say that they did all they could to make workplaces safe.

Kevin Jones

Category: politics

The value of brevity in government submissions and business reports

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How Workers’ Memorial Day should be treated

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Migrant worker safety

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Roadwork zone speed limit enforcement

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Financial dive for WorkCover NSW

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The misuse of OHS in industrial relations campaigns

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Why won’t the Tasmanian government release the OHS report into the Beaconsfield mine collapse?

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