Issue 165 - SafetyNet Journal 165
Welcome to the latest edition of SafetyNet, featuring OHS news from Australia and around the world.Union News
Research
WorkSafe News
Worksafe Prosecutions
International News
Events
Union News
Activities for reps
WRMC agrees to harmonisation model
The Workplace Relations Ministers Council (WRMC) met on 17 May and agreed to move ahead with the harmonisation strategy based on the recommendation of the OHS national laws review panel. This comes despite strong union concerns about the model laws. Workers face the significant watering down of their health and safety protections if model laws are adopted as is. Safe Work Australia has been tasked to draft legislation reflecting the model laws to be presented by the end of the year. Western Australia has threatened to withdraw from the process. The ACTU and VTHC have vowed to fight for the highest standard OHS laws. The ACTU said the WRMC had failed in its commitment to bringing in laws that would increase safety saying the Council of Australian Governments pledged to lift health and safety standards, not lower them.
ACTU response to decision
WRMC Communiqué
OHS Reps – Launch of ad campaign on
Don’t Risk 2nd Rate Safety Laws
Workers win maternity leave in Federal Budget
Unions are celebrating the Government’s plan to introduce a paid maternity leave scheme as outlined in the Federal Budget released last week. The decision comes on the back of a thirty-year campaign by unions for a better deal for working women. The scheme allows for a18 weeks paid leave and should be in operation by 1 January 2011. It will require the support of other parties in the Senate for this start date to come into effect.
Ambos vote on strike action over fatigue
Victorian paramedics have begun voting on the first ambulance strike in 36 years, as they prepare to ramp up their campaign against fatigue. Year-long pay talks with the Government are deadlocked and a major sticking point is its refusal to support minimum 10-hour rest breaks between shifts.
“Paramedics are dedicated professionals. They are absolutely determined to reduce fatigue and provide Victoria with a safer ambulance service,” said Steve McGhie, Ambulance Employees Australia State Secretary. “Every day our paramedics are forced to make life and death decisions in a fatigued state because of insufficient fatigue breaks. That is unacceptable. Paramedics do not want to take industrial action. But this government has left them with no alternative.”
Paramedics plan to enforce 10-hour fatigue breaks between shifts, one of 18 different types of industrial action planned. The action is aimed at ensuring they are properly rested and that any risk to the Victorian community from fatigued paramedics is reduced. The action will force Ambulance Victoria to find other paramedics to cover the additional two hours of fatigue breaks that paramedics require to be properly rested for their next shift.
Response Time website
Victorian swine flu cases renew calls for pandemic preparedness
As SafetyNet goes to broadcast there are ten confirmed cases of swine fu in Australia, with four children at an inner-city Melbourne school the most prominent examples. With Australia at the beginning of flu season, workplaces need to be prepared for possible cases.
The Australian Medical Association (AMA) has recommend workplaces adopt hygiene measures to battle the swine flu pandemic. According to the AMA, good personal hygiene will help reduce the transmission of swine flu in workplaces. It recommends that everyone in a workplace:
- washes hands regularly with soap and water
- uses alcohol-based sanitisers
- covers their mouths while coughing or sneezing
- disposes of used tissues appropriately.
Employers should be developing pandemic preparedness plans - in consultation with elected health and safety representatives, as advocated in the previous edition of SafetyNet. If your organisation has yet to develop a flu pandemic preparedness plan you can do so using the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet’s publication Pandemic Planning In The Workplace [pdf] .
See the OHS Reps – Swine flu hazards page for more information on pandemic preparedness.
Hazelwood power station may be shut down over safety concerns: CFMEU
Victoria's Hazelwood Power station could face "operational problems" unless it addresses safety concerns stemming from a strike by emergency services officers (ESOs), the union representing the workers says.
The 12 ESOs, who are employed by contractor Diamond Protection Pty Ltd to provide first-response services including first-aid, fire-fighting and security at the power station, have been on strike almost continuously since April over their claim for an improved pay deal. According to the CFMEU (mining and energy division), employees at the station fear that workers brought in to replace the ESOs are not sufficiently skilled to do the job. As a result, OHS representatives at the station want the contractor at the beginning of each shift to provide an "audit" of the experience and qualifications of the replacement emergency services employees who will be working.
Source: Workplace Express
Seven-year-old girl in Mt Isa blood lead case has arthritis
A seven-year-old girl from Mount Isa in north-west Queensland, whose family is suing a mining company over elevated lead levels in her blood, has now been diagnosed with arthritis. Daphne Hare launched a civil damages claim against Xstrata Mining, the State Government and Mount Isa City Council after tests revealed her daughter had high lead levels in her blood. Tests in Townsville last Friday have confirmed Stella Hare, now seven-years-old, has developed arthritis. Ms Hare says a specialist had been concerned her daughter's lead exposure could lead to the condition.
ABC news
Huge fire spews acid cloud over bay
Hundreds of workers were evacuated when a huge fire spewed toxic smoke over the bay at the Bluescope Steel plant in Hastings south east of Melbourne on 13 May. About 150 firefighters battled the blaze at the plant for 5 hours. Plastic tanks holding hundreds of litres of hydrochloric acid caught fire. Two firefighters were treated for acid irritation at the scene. Police and WorkSafe are investigating the cause of the blaze.
ABC news report
Asbestos News
James Hardie cries poor on asbestos fund – ‘Will not pay’
James Hardie is citing the global financial crisis as reason not to fund its obligations to the Asbestos Injuries Compensation Fund, resulting in a shortfall of up $160 million this year. With cash reserves of $140 million and projected liabilities of $200 million in the next two years, there are concerns the fund could run out of money by the middle of 2010. Under the terms of the 2006 agreement between the company and state and federal governments, James Hardie contributes 35 per cent of its cash flow to victims of asbestos exposure via the fund. The company claims that it has experienced a negative cashflow of $US45 million, despite recording profits of $176 million.
Asbestos victims groups are outraged at the appearance that the company id once again dodging its obligation to those afflicted by diseases caused by the deadly product. Asbestos support groups have written to the Prime Minister and state premiers calling for them to prop up the fund in the immediate short term and be repaid by the company when it returns to positive cashflow in the future.
ADSVic
The Australian report
ABC news
Asbestos pages on OHS Reps
Canada continues to promote lethal asbestos epidemic
Alarmed by the epidemics of lung cancer caused by White Asbestos (Chrysotile Asbestos), a team of Canadian officials met an Indian delegation of trade unions, occupational and environmental health experts and researchers to discuss the human cost of continued use and trade of white asbestos products. This happened in the wake of the shocking decision by Canada to continue its promotion of the killer fibre despite a Health Canada report indicting the Quebec and Canadian government’s support to the industry. The recent report “India’s Asbestos Time Bomb” has also shone a spotlight on the industry. The Canadian and Indian governments have unleashed a misinformation campaign about the mythical safe and controlled use of asbestos products, unmindful of the fact that so far some fifty countries have banned all forms of asbestos, and are already using alternative materials.
Ban Asbestos
World Bank avoids asbestos in new construction, warns of installed asbestos
The World Bank has issued a Good Practice Note, Asbestos: Occupational and Community Health Issues. The note outlines the health risks related to exposure to asbestos, lists resources on international good practices to minimize these risks, and describes some of the available alternatives to asbestos-containing products.
The note advises that it is good practice to minimize the health risks associated with asbestos products by avoiding their use in new construction and renovation and, if installed asbestos-containing materials are encountered, by using internationally recognized standards and best practices to deal with them.
It notes that the Bank expects borrowers and other clients to use alternative materials whenever feasible.
BWINT news release
USA: WR Grace escapes justice on asbestos crimes
A federal jury in Montana has acquitted chemical giant WR Grace and Company and three of its former executives of knowingly exposing mine workers and residents of Libby, Montana, to asbestos and then covering up their actions. Hundreds of miners and residents of Libby have died, and at least 1,200 more have developed cancer or lung disease from exposure to the asbestos-containing ore from WR Grace's vermiculite mine. The verdict has was greeted with disappointment in Libby, where residents had already seen to their increasing dismay a hostile judge repeatedly attack prosecutors and rule inadmissible key evidence of WR Grace's culpability.
Risks 406
Nanotechnology News
NGOs Disappointed at Nano Outcome of International Conference on Chemical Management
The Second International Conference on Chemicals Management (ICCM) meeting in Geneva last week addressed nanotechnolgoy and manufactured nanoparticles as an emerging policy issue for the first time. NGOs worked to urge the ICCM to take effective action on nano-scale technologies but were left disappointed at the outcomes of the conference. “We are a long way from the statement that was adopted less than a year ago at the meeting organized by the International Forum on Chemical Safety in Dakar,” said Diana Bronson from ETC Group. “There, governments, industry, trade unions and non-governmental organizations had agreed that the precautionary principle needed to be applied, that countries should have the right to say no to nanotechnology and that special measures need to be taken to protect vulnerable groups. We got none of that in Geneva.”
The Dakar statement was undermined during the preparatory period of this conference, marginalizing the UN and along with it, the majority of its member states. Successive drafts, negotiated during late night sessions in English only, placed the OECD and the International Standards Organization firmly in charge of the issue. This version failed to get the support of delegates.
Nanowerk news
International Union News
UK: Move to stop blacklisting of union reps
The UK government intends to introduce new regulations to prevent union members being denied employment by secret blacklists, business secretary Peter Mandelson has said. In March, the Information Commissioner reported that 40 construction companies had subscribed to a database used to vet construction workers, which has now been closed under data protection law. It is believed many of those on the blacklist were targeted because of their union health and safety role. Unions in the construction sector had for years pressed for legal protection for union reps and activists.
Risks 406
BBC
Research
Formaldehyde raises blood cancer risk, especially in workers
Exposure to formaldehyde may be linked to blood and lymphatic cancers, particularly myeloid leukemia, researchers have found. In an analysis of workers exposed to formaldehyde during their careers, the agent was associated with a 37% increased risk of death from such cancers in those with the highest exposures according to Laura E. Beane Freeman, Ph.D., of the US National Cancer Institute. "The overall patterns of risk seen in this extended follow-up of industrial workers . . . are consistent with a causal association between formaldehyde exposure and cancers of the blood and lymphatic system and warrant continued concern," the group reported online in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute. Since the 1980s, the Institute has studied a cohort of 25,619 workers employed before Jan. 1, 1966 in 10 industrial plants that produced formaldehyde in molded-plastic products, photographic film, decorative laminates, and plywood.The research found a significant increase in risk of death from myeloid leukemia was 78% higher among industrial workers with the highest peak exposures, compared with the lowest, but the trend was not significant.
Mortality From Lymphohematopoietic Malignancies Among Workers in Formaldehyde Industries: The National Cancer Institute Cohort Laura E. Beane Freeman, Aaron Blair, Jay H. Lubin, Patricia A. Stewart, Richard B. Hayes, Robert N. Hoover, Michael Hauptmann; JNCI Journal of the National Cancer Institute 2009 101(10):751-761; doi:10.1093/jnci/djp096
MedPage Today
WorkSafe News
WorkSafe Victoria concerned over high number of prohibition notices
WorkSafe Victoria is concerned over the high number of prohibition notices it has issued to employers during its week-long inspection campaign in the Cranebourne area. There were six prohibition notices and 71 improvement notices issued, and 21 safety issues were fixed on the spot while inspectors were present. WorkSafe's executive director John Merrit said this was one of the highest number of prohibition notices issued for this type of campaign. WorkSafe visited 147 workplaces as part of the campaign, and will be returning to the area to ensure notices are complied with.
VWA media release
National campaign to reduce aggression-related injuries in hospitals
WorkSafe is taking part in a national campaign aimed at reducing the incidence of injuries related to workplace aggression in hospitals.
Heads of Workplace Safety Authorities (HWSA) Chairman, John Watson, said the campaign aimed to reduce injury rates resulting from aggression in emergency departments, other clinical areas and hospital-based services.
The national campaign will look at aggression management systems and how existing controls were working. WorkSafe’s publication ‘
Prevention and management of aggression in health services’
is a good reference for this.
VWA media release
Useful Materials
- Real estate property inspection safety
- Stevedoring - Work environment inspections
This is a solution for workers undertaking loading and discharge of cargo vessels in the absence of regular inspections of the work environment. - Call centres - Preventing vocal fatigue
This is a solution for preventing vocal fatigue.
Worksafe Prosecutions
Record fine after go cart death sets new bar for OHS prosecutions
The County Court has handed down a record $1.4 million fine to a Port Melbourne go cart company after a female customer died there three years ago. AAA Auscarts Pty Ltd went into liquidation in 2008 and did not defend the case involving three charges laid under the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004. It’s the highest ever fine in Victoria for an offence under that Act 2004. The only higher fine for OHS Act breaches was in relation to the Esso Longford gas plant explosion which resulted in fines totalling $2m for 11 charges. The prosecution of Esso was under the OHS Act 1985.
The woman died at the AAA Auscarts site in October 2006 when the cart she was driving crashed into a barrier made from tyres. She suffered a fractured skull when her head hit the steering wheel of the cart. In the three years prior to her death there had been seven separate incidents resulting in injuries at the Port Melbourne site.
The fines related to three charges under the OHS Act 2004:
Section 21(1) and Section 21(1) (c) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 for failing to maintain a workplace in a condition which was safe and without risks to health. Penalty - $300,000 with conviction
Section 23(1) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 which relates to an employers duty to persons other than employees.(Auscart breached its duty to MS Carter and customers by reason of unsafe barriers) Penalty - $600,000 with conviction.
Section 23 (1) of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 which relates to an employers duty to persons other than employees.(Auscart breached its duty to Ms Carter and customers by failing to ensure customers were only permitted to drive go carts if fitted with properly fitted and adjusted seat belts.) Penalty - $500,000 with conviction.
VWA media release
Crane company fined over worker death
A Melbourne crane company has been fined $70,000 after a man was killed by a falling concrete panel in Melbourne three years ago. The 58 year old man was killed at a work site in Pakenham in Melbourne's outer south-east on March 8, 2006, when a concrete panel which was being lifted into place fell on him. The company erecting the panel, Huntingdale Mobile Cranes, pleaded guilty to two counts of failing to provide a safe work environment, in the County Court.
VWA media release
Victorian and Queensland fines for mishandling asbestos
A Victorian demolition worker was convicted and fined in the State Magistrates Court after undertaking asbestos removal work without a licence. The court heard the worker's Class B asbestos removal licence expired in October 2006, but he was still permitted to remove asbestos in quantities of less than 10 square metres for no more than an hour during a seven-day period under the regulation 4.3.45 of the Occupational Health and Safety Regulations 2007. However, investigations found the worker had removed more than the permitted amount before he was stopped by WorkSafe inspectors. The worker pleaded not guilty, and was fined $750 and ordered to pay $2,760 in court costs.
In a separate case in Queensland, a demolition operator was put on a good behaviour bond of $7,500 for two years and ordered to pay $1,225.40 in court costs after pleading guilty to breaching his obligations as a demolition operator and not handling asbestos appropriately.
VWA media release
Severed arm leads to $40k fine
A button manufacturer has been fined $40,000 without conviction over an incident where a worker had an arm severed in 2007. The injured worker had previously raised safety concerns at Forbes Buttons Ltd in East Brunswick. The machine on which he was working was not adequately guarded to protect against such incidents.
WorkSafe advisory notice on machine guarding
VWA media release
International News
Norwegian rail workers win protection against violence
Railway workers in Norway have won improved protection against violence at work, following their unions’ lobbying efforts. Workers represented by two ITF-affiliates, Norsk Jernbaneforbund and Norsk Lokomotivmannsforbund, successfully won an amendment to existing criminal law after the union engaged the government in talks to improve the plight of railway workers who were experiencing increasing violence, particularly at night. The amendment comes into force before July and is set to extend protection to workers in the private sector, including railway, bus, metro and taxi firms. Previously, only state-owned companies’ workers were covered.
ITF news release
Climate change greatest health threat of 21st century
Climate change will be the biggest global health threat in the 21st century, but little is known about its possible effects on developing countries, where the impact will be felt most, says a new report. "Information that is reliable, accurate, and disseminated is fundamental for effective adaptation and to avoid the so-called adaptation apartheid," said the report by a commission set up by the British medical journal, The Lancet, and the University College London (UCL) Institute for Global Health, in a cooperative advocacy effort to highlight the threat of global warming to health.
IRIN Global News
Events
Seminars and conferences
Seminar: Working without commitments: Precarious employment and
health
May 26, 1pm. Room 515, Level 5, 207 Bouverie Street
Melbourne University, Dr Wayne Lewchuk (from Canada) will be speaking on precarious employment.
Prophet and Loss
A new play commissioned with input from Work-related Grief Support
clients, and was commissioned by Creative Ministries Network. 'Prophet and Loss' is a thought-provoking and powerful theatre performance telling true stories of some WGS clients bereaved by work-related death.
10th to 19th June 2009
Wyselaskie Hall, Uniting Church Centre for Theology &
Ministry, 1 Morrison Close, Parkville. Tickets cost $30:00, or $25.00
concession. To purchase your tickets, please ring the booking office on 9340 8842.
At Trades Hall (Cnr Victoria and Lygon St, Carlton Sth)
Return to Work Unit
The Victorian Trades Hall Council Return to Work Unit challenges the barriers that stop injured workers returning to full and meaningful employment. A big part of the VTHC initiative is to provide training to workers and their representatives. Check out the training scheduled for 2009
VTHC OHS Training Centre
Initial 5-Day Metropolitan (for Elected OHS Reps under the Victorian OHS Act - this course is approved by the VWA under Section 67)
June 3, 4, 5, 11, 12 Health Carlton
June 22 – 26 Initial Carlton
Course hours: 9am - 5pm. Course fee $670.00
Initial 5-Day Country
June 29 – July 3 Initial Geelong
Course hours: 9am - 5pm. Course fee $690.00
Comcare 5-Day OHS Reps Course (for Elected OHS Reps under the Comcare Act)
July 13 - 17 Carlton
Course hours: 9am - 5pm. Course fee $650.00
2-Day Metropolitan
This 2-day course is an overview designed for managers, supervisors and committee members. It is NOT a replacement for the VWA approved 5-day training for elected reps.
June 18 and 19 Carlton
Course hours: 9.30am - 4.30pm. Course fee $350.00
1-Day Refresher
The Refresher course is approved by the VWA under Section 67 of the Victorian OHS Act 2004 for elected reps and deputies.
June 15 Legislative Update Carlton
June 16 Psychological Hazards Carlton
July 27 Psychological Hazards Carlton
Course hours: 9am - 4.30pm. Course fee $180.00
Go to the 2009 Training program page of the website for all the dates of upcoming courses, and to download an application form.