Ross Wilson: Worker participation key to act

By ROSS WILSON*

The Council of Trade Unions is ready to make "worker participation" in workplace health and safety a reality by organising the election and training of up to 10,000 health and safety representatives within the next 12 months.

It is worker participation, more than any of the other changes to the Health and Safety in Employment Act, which came into effect yesterday , that has the potential to make a positive difference to our appalling workplace fatality statistics.

In the political debate around the changes, the focus has been on increased maximum fines and increased focus on occupational health issues such as stress and fatigue.

But nothing will change unless we get down to applied injury prevention and health protection strategies in the workplace.

Despite popular myth, work accidents and disease do not generally occur because of apathy, carelessness or stupidity on the part of workers, but through unsafe and unhealthy systems, processes and tools of work.

This has been proven conclusively by international research, including an exhaustive survey of 2000 accidents undertaken by the Institute of Industrial Psychology in Britain.

Occupational safety and health (OSH) legislation must therefore encourage employers and workers to develop and maintain safe and healthy systems in all workplaces, including proper knowledge, training and supervision.

More active OSH enforcement and increased fines will help, but we need to change the workplace culture so that safe systems of work are put in place and maintained.

International research also shows that structured, union-supported participation by workers in workplace health and safety can result in real improvements to standards.

The political decision in 1992 to weaken the Health and Safety in Employment Act by leaving out employee participation provisions is reflected in our relatively poor performance. Management was given sole responsibility, and as an overall legal framework it has failed.

In fact we have been experiencing a workplace accident crisis, with 74 (OSH recorded) workplace accident fatalities for the year to last June, compared with a total of 39 for the previous 12 months.

And the tragic reality is that this is only the tip of the iceberg. OSH has reported that, on a conservative estimate, more than 400 people die each year in New Zealand as a result of work-related accidents and disease.

As well as the huge cost of pain and anguish to the families, the monetary cost to business and society of not preventing workplace accidents and disease is very high.

Experts estimate that the annual cost of accidents and disease in New Zealand is about 4 per cent of GDP. This amounts to a $4.2 billion a year cost to the economy.

If we could reduce the current high incidence of accidents and disease by even half in the March 2004 year, which is forecast at 2.5 per cent, we would lift GDP growth over 4 per cent.

Another concern for business should be that the health and safety risks in some sectors are a barrier to recruitment. These include the forestry and construction sectors, as well as some areas of health, education and the core public service.

The new health and safety laws provide us with a real opportunity to make a new commitment to improving health and safety in our workplaces.

For the CTU the health and safety of our 300,000 affiliated union members is a top priority. We are developing projects with ACC, OSH and employer groups to ensure that elected and trained worker health and safety representatives play an effective role in working with employers to cut the toll of workplace accidents and disease.

The CTU sees good health and safety practice as good business and an integral part of the Government's focus on people as an asset and expenditure on their educational, skill and social development as an important investment in our future.

From a human rights perspective every worker has the right to be protected by a reasonable minimum code of employment, fair employment laws, and health and safety regulation.

It is therefore disappointing that some business organisations have opposed the new laws because they "increase compliance costs". The real cost is in doing nothing about our appalling performance.

I hope that now that the politics of the law change are behind us we can get a smooth, and speedy, implementation of the new worker participation systems. The new act reflects a proven statutory framework on which a co-operative safety culture of best practice prevention can be built.

* Ross Wilson is president of the Council of Trade Unions