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Risks

issue no 153 - 24 April 2004

Editor: Rory O'Neill of Hazards magazine. Comments to Tom Mellish

CONTENTS

Risks is the TUC’s weekly online bulletin for safety reps and others, read each week by over 9,500 subscribers and 1,500 on the TUC website. To receive this bulletin every week, click here. Past issues are available. This edition contains Useful links TUC courses for safety reps Disclaimer and Privacy statement.

ACTION

What are you doing on Workers’ Memorial Day?

There are a record number of events nationwide for this year’s Workers’ Memorial Day. The TUC website lists 28 April events from Dounreay on the north-east tip of Scotland to Plymouth on the south-west coast of England. Continuing the theme of 'employer accountability' and 'safe work for all,' TUC says: 'When all those who are responsible for workers health and safety are truly held to account, there will be a significant improvement in the work-life and health of workers.' It adds: 'The purpose behind Workers' Memorial Day has always been to ‘remember the dead: fight for the living’ and unions are asked to focus on both areas, by considering memorials to all those killed through work but at the same time ensuring that such tragedies are not repeated. That can best be done by building trade union organisation, and campaigning for stricter enforcement with higher penalties for breaches of health and safety laws.'

  • Workers’ Memorial Day posters (free - pictured above) and forget-me-knot ribbons (30p each plus a SAE, 30p each for 2-99 ribbons including p+p, or £25 per 100 including p+p) are available from Greater Manchester Hazards Centre, 23 New Mount Street, Manchester, M4 4DE. Tel: 0161 953 4037.

Workers’ Memorial Day worldwide

Thousands of unions and millions of workers in over 100 countries will be marking Workers’ Memorial Day, 28 April, with events, protests and conferences. To find out about what is going on from Argentina to Australia and from Palestine to Peru, see the Hazards Workers’ Memorial Day global reports.

UNION NEWS

Dangerous fight for unsafe machinery

Safety markings on workplace machinery sold throughout Europe could be leaving workers at risk. And, warns Brussels-based union safety watchdog TUTB, the situation could now get worse as two Finnish businesses use the courts to try to ensure free movement of goods takes priority over safety. 'Much work equipment bearing the CE marking does not comply with safety requirements, causing work accidents as a result,' says TUTB’s Laurent Vogel. He warns that the two cases brought before the European Court of Justice by private companies could make matters considerably worse for workers across the European Union. The firms, who had been subject to legal action by safety authorities and the courts for supplying unsafe work equipment - in one case leading to a worker losing several fingers - say safety enforcement 'constitutes unlawful barriers to the free movement of goods.' TUTB’s Laurent Vogel is urging national governments to make representations to the European Court about this bid to interfere with the operation of crucial national safety laws. If the cases prove successful, says Vogel, European law would undermine the Health and Safety at Work Act duties on suppliers of work equipment. He says unions should highlight the dangers posed by these court actions, which if successful would tie the hands of official safety enforcement agencies throughout the EU.

Union lawyers slam claims firm cons

Trade union lawyers Thompsons and print union GPMU have attacked no win-no fee personal injury claims management firms for conning people into agreements that can cost them more than the compensation they receive. The charge comes after GPMU member Terence Pringle, who received £1,250 in compensation for injuries he received in a car crash, was told he owed over £2,000 to the collapsed personal injury claims firm The Accident Group (TAG). The debt is made up of a 'loan' for nearly £1,000 with interest of 15.9 per cent APR, a 'document fee' of £20 and £799 'disbursements.' His case came to light when he went to Thompsons Solicitors, the GPMU law firm, for advice after an accident at work unconnected to the road traffic accident. Had he used the union's legal scheme instead of TAG for his road traffic accident he would not have had to pay a penny in legal costs. Tony Dubbins, GPMU general secretary said the no win-no fee claim was a 'cruel lie', adding: 'Unlike claims management firms, union legal schemes do not charge members a penny, are not profit driven and do not go bust because of the ups and downs of the insurance market… At the end of the day trade union membership gives the best and safest legal protection money can buy.'

Union calls for action on school violence

Parents of unruly children should be made to attend compulsory behaviour management classes to help them control their youngsters, teachers’ union NASUWT has said. The union, whose surveys suggest that a teacher in a British classroom suffers verbal or physical abuse every seven minutes, also renewed its call for airport-style security checks in schools to spot pupils carrying concealed weapons. NASUWT deputy general secretary, Chris Keates, conceded that parents would have to grant permission for checks to be conducted on their children, but said she believed the 'vast majority' would endorse the initiative because it helped to increase safety. Schools were sometimes reluctant to report violent incidents for fear of publicity, Ms Keates said. In fact, they should regard logging the incident as a public sign that they would not tolerate such behaviour. The union also demanded that pupils should be automatically excluded from lessons if they overstepped fixed behaviour criteria, which it said should be written into teachers' contracts.

Courts urged to get tough on bus driver assaults

Bus workers’ union TGWU has called for the courts to take a tougher line with those convicted of assaults on bus drivers. In a speech to the Scottish TUC in Glasgow, Jack Dromey, the union’s deputy general secretary, said he was appalled by the high levels of violence faced by drivers in Scotland. He said: 'As a society, we must say it is totally unacceptable to attack bus workers doing their job. The time has come to jail thugs who brutalise bus workers.' Mr Dromey backed plans from the Scottish First Minister Jack McConnell to introduce legislation to deal with attacks on frontline emergency services workers. He said it would send a powerful message of confidence and support if the Scottish Parliament was to extend those plans to the bus drivers who are in the frontline of delivering a public service. Last week, public sector union UNISON said the proposed law should be extended to cover other frontline public sector workers (Risks 152).

OTHER NEWS

MP’s 'great concern' over work safety

Great Grimsby Labour MP Austin Mitchell is highlighting disquiet about the lack of progress with the Health and Safety Commission’s 'Revitalising health and safety strategy.' A 20 April Early Day Motion (EDM) says 'this House expresses great concern that the 46 recommendations for improving health and safety at work contained in the HSC strategy statement, Revitalising Health and Safety, published in June 2000 have still not been implemented' and adds it 'is concerned that as a result many more employees have had to take time of sick, have been injured, have suffered permanent disablement and some have been killed at work; believes the failure to implement the recommendations in full has put hundreds of thousands of employees at greater risk of illness or injury; and consequently urges the Government to act speedily to address these concerns.' A November 2003 HSE evaluation concluded occupational ill-health 'is likely to have risen' since the 'revitalising' strategy was introduced.

Warning over fake health and safety agencies

The Health and Safety Executive (HSE) is urged firms to ignore information they receive from three firms purporting to regulate health and safety. HSE says it has received hundreds of complaints from companies across the country that have been sent requests for payments of between £125 and £249 which they say are necessary to ensure compliance with health and safety laws. The three firms - Health and Safety Compliance Agency (HSCA), Health and Safety Enforcement Agency (HSEA) and Health and Safety Registration Enforcement Division (HSRED) - have written to companies all over Great Britain on official-looking letterhead asking for the cash. Justin McCracken, HSE’s deputy directory general, said: 'None of these companies is connected to HSE. Organisations should be very wary of any approach from these firms, or any company ‘offering’ similar services. All three firms use wording suggesting they are official enforcement bodies, but they are not.' He added: 'These companies are asking for significant sums of money, claiming they will send out information, much of which HSE provides free of charge.' HSE is liaising with trading standards offices and the police, who are investigating all three companies.

Solvent 'raises risk of cancer'

A solvent found in varnishes, paints, dyes and fuel additives and which is used in the semiconductor industry may raise the risk of cancer among women taking hormone treatments, say researchers. They found the chemical, ethylene glycol methyl ether (EGME), boosted the activity of hormones used in HRT and the contraceptive pill. This may increase the risk of breast or ovarian cancer for some women. The study by Duke University in the US is published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The researchers say there is as yet no direct evidence that these interactions have an impact on human health. However, EGME is one of a group of chemicals called glycol ethers which have long been linked to cancer and reproductive hazards in humans. The Duke team believes exposure to EGME may also be to blame for some cases of miscarriage and infertility.

NHS trusts putting pregnant doctors at risk

Some NHS trusts are exploiting pregnant junior doctors at the expense of health and safety, according to an article in BMJ Careers. The 24 April edition reveals how some pregnant doctors are expected to work excessive hours and are often exposed to violent or aggressive patients. It also says there are major discrepancies in the way trusts apply guidelines to protect the rights of pregnant women in the workplace. With more women entering the medical profession, pregnant doctors will become more common, says the author, Joanna Smith. Guidelines that address the health and safety of pregnant workers are being inconsistently applied across the health professions, she says, concluding information needs to be distributed better, and trusts must prepare alternative work arrangements to accommodate the health and safety needs of their staff. 'Pregnancy is a foreseeable event and lasts for a set time,' she says. 'We should all ask ourselves, ‘Would we want the health and safety of our wife, sister, or daughter, and her unborn child, compromised?’ Unlikely.'

  • Pregnant doctors: health and safety risks in the real world. BMJ Careers, vol. 328, issue 7446, pages 168-169, 24 April 2004 [pdf].

Legal threat on passive smoke at work

The hospitality trade could soon face legal action arising from its 'stubborn failure to act' on warnings about possible health damage caused to employees by passive smoking. A leaflet from health campaigning charity Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) and Thompsons, the UK's largest personal injury and trade union law firm, advises employees whose health may have been affected by breathing in other people's smoke at work, and is to be distributed nationwide by unions and health groups. ASH estimates that at least three million employees are still routinely exposed to secondhand smoke at work. In January this year, ASH and Thompsons sent a registered letter to all the UK's leading hospitality trade employers, warning them that the 'date of guilty knowledge' under the Health and Safety at Work Act is now past, and that employers should know the risks of exposing their staff to secondhand smoke (Risks 139). Employers who continue to permit smoking in the workplace are likely to be held liable by the courts for any health damage caused, they say.

Designers still have a long way to go

Building designers are still not doing enough to design out risk, the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has concluded. During February 2004 HSE inspectors continued a 'designer initiative', meeting with designers as their buildings were going up to quiz them about what they had done to design out risk. Inspectors asked the designers to explain their actions, including what they had done during the design stage to reduce the risks of working at height and the risks to maintenance workers during the life of the structure. HSE’s Joy Jones said: 'We found that designers who go on to site often and consult with those constructing the buildings had a better appreciation of the problems created by some of their ideas and could collaborate with contractors to design a workable and safer solution. However we are concerned that some designers wanted to rely on harnesses as a means of preventing people falling when it is much better to design out the need to work at height, or if it is necessary, ensure it can be done from a safe place of work with proper guardrails. Overall I have to conclude that there is still a long way to go before we can say that designers are making a real contribution to reducing the toll of death and injury caused by falls from height in this industry.'

Musicians suffer skin disorders

Musicians risk afflictions including 'guitar nipple' and 'fiddler's neck', a new study has reported. The report said guitarists could suffer a form of mastitis, a breast inflammation, while holding the instrument. Violin players also suffered a form of skin complaint in their necks, the study found and also suggested musicians got allergies from playing instruments. The report by Dr Thilo Gambichler of Oldchurch Hospital in east London was published in the journal BMC Dermatology. Dr Gambichler said he had found allergies to rosin, used to wax bows in string instruments and in reeds of clarinets and saxophones. Other players using flutes and brass instruments were found to suffer allergies to nickel, which could cause dermatitis of the lips.

  • Thilo Gambichler, Stefanie Boms and Marcus Freitag. Contact dermatitis and other skin conditions in instrumental musicians, BMC Dermatology, vol.4, page 3, 2004 [abstract]. BBC News Online.

INTERNATIONAL

Australia: Workers reject uranium drink apology

Workers who were exposed to uranium-contaminated drinking water have rejected an apology from their employer, a part of global mining giant Rio Tinto. Miners working for Energy Resources of Australia (ERA) say they are concerned about long-term health risks from their exposures at the Ranger mine in Kakadu. 'It's a pretty hollow apology when to date ERA has refused to hand over information about the contaminants in the water,' said Hayden Stephens, a lawyer representing three workers who suffered aches, lethargy, headaches and diarrhoea after drinking water that contained 400 times the legal limit of uranium. He said the workers were asking how ERA could declare at its annual meeting that there would be no long-term effect on the men's health and at the same time refuse to give them any information. 'In the one breath ERA are expressing deep regret for the distress caused to the men,' he said. 'Yet in the next it is refusing to hand over critical information concerning their workers' health.' ERA admit 28 workers had reported symptoms after contaminated process water was 'erroneously connected to the system that supplies drinking and showering water' at the mine on 23 March.

China: World turns a blind eye to work injuries

In a grim replay of the industrial revolution in the United States and other countries, industrial machinery will crush or sever the arms, hands and fingers of some 40,000 Chinese workers this year, according to official Chinese government news agencies. Some experts privately say the true number is higher. And independent groups monitoring labour standards in China say foreign companies that relentlessly demand lower prices and US consumers who gobble up low-cost goods, contribute to the problem. Zhou Litai, a lawyer who represents hundreds of workers maimed or killed at work, said foreign consumers should be aware that some 'Made in China' products 'are tainted with blood from cut-off fingers or hands.' Some workers would prefer to die because their parents would get a larger one-time compensation, said Luo Yun, professor of workplace safety. 'There's a popular saying now: ‘We can afford to die, but we can't afford to be injured’,' Luo said. US union federation AFL-CIO this month petitioned the Bush administration to demand that it pressure China to improve working conditions.

El Salvador/USA: GAP crosses the union divide in factory campaign

US garment workers’ union UNITE and high street clothes store Gap are jointly supporting an effort by displaced garment workers in El Salvador to open that country’s first independent and fully unionised apparel export factory. In 2002, UNITE led a consumer campaign designed to raise awareness about conditions in factories producing clothes for Gap and other US retailers. The campaign featured a factory in El Salvador that had been closed by its owners following a union dispute. Gap Inc. was one of the factory’s several customers. The new Just Garments factory, a co-op part-owned by the workers, is employing workers who lost their jobs during the dispute and is the first unionised export factory in the country. As part of its efforts with UNITE to assist the workers, Gap Inc. is committed to placing an order with the factory. Bruce Raynor, president of UNITE, said: 'This industry is riddled with problems worldwide. We’re excited about working with the Gap to create some positive examples that show garment factories can be successful and protect labour standards.'

USA: Republicans push for asbestos bail-out

The latest attempt by US Republicans to push through a cut-price asbestos compensation deal is reaching decision time. The Senate has started what it is anticipated will be a lengthy debate on the business-backed Fairness in Asbestos Injury and Resolution Act of 2004 (FAIR); Republican efforts to push a decision on 22 April failed. Senior Republicans anticipate FAIR itself will fail - the proposed $114bn (£64bn) cash-capped pot would be too small and is described by critics as an asbestos industry 'bail-out' or 'corporate welfare' - but are hoping to make it an election year issue anyway. Bill Frist, Republican leader in the Senate, has said he will make it a 'personal priority' to deal with what he calls 'the current asbestos litigation crisis.' Paul Brodeur, writing in The Nation, points out the asbestos companies pressing for this law, and championed by Frist who has described key players Johns-Manville Corporation and WR Grace and Company as 'reputable companies', frequently have far from untarnished reputations. Brodeur says Johns-Manville instituted a corporate policy not to inform sick workers about x-ray findings showing that they had developed asbestos disease. WR Grace is at the centre of an on-going scandal in Libby, Montana, where hundreds of workers and members of the public have developed cancers thanks to asbestos contamination from the company’s vermiculite mine.

USA: NY firefighters traumatised by 9/11

Firefighters who worked at ground zero of the World Trade Center are experiencing high rates of depression, anxiety and stress, according to a new study. The survey of 2,000 firefighters found that 62 per cent of those who worked at ground zero in the first month after the World Trade Center collapse still experience at least occasional bouts of depression, said Samuel Bacharach, director of the Smithers Institute at Cornell University's School of Industrial and Labor Relations, which conducted the study. Depression was half as common among firefighters who had not worked at ground zero. The study found that 84 per cent of those who had worked at ground zero in the first month were still reporting occasional stress, compared with 61 percent of those who were not at ground zero. 'These guys are under strain,' Bacharach said. 'Depression is up, anxiety figures are up. All the basic indicators are really up.' The report found admirable levels of teamwork, openness and self-criticism among firefighters and officers in the city's firehouses, Bacharach said. But the rank-and-file reported they were alienated from and unheeded by decision-makers at the upper levels of the 11,000-member department, he said.

RESOURCES

Green Labor

Green Labor is an initiative of a well-respected union-supported health, safety and environment group in the US. It produces: A newsletter providing working people with the latest environmental information and with news about unions and environment collaborations; educational programmes for workers about critical environmental issues and effective alliance-building; and educational materials, including in-depth training workbooks, videos and booklets 'for an audience of working people.' The materials are produced with a sensitivity to both workplace and environmental issues. You can sign up for the newsletter and free email alerts at the website.

EVENTS AND COURSES

TUC courses for safety reps

COURSES FOR SEPTEMBER TO DECEMBER 2003

Midlands, North, North West, Scotland, South East, South West, Wales, Yorkshire and Humberside

Homeworkers conference, London, 10 May

A 10 May conference at the TUC Education Centre in London will mark the start of a month of 'Made at home' campaign activities aimed at securing rights and respect for UK homeworkers. Speakers will include TUC general secretary Brendan Barber, Phil Bloomer, head of advocacy at Oxfam, and Linda Devereaux, director of the National Group on Homeworking (NGH). Workshop sessions will include organising homeworkers in the UK; campaigning ideas for homeworker labour rights; using the ILO convention as a tool to protect UK homeworkers; and vulnerable workers in the global supply chain. Following the conference, the TUC will be supporting a week of regional roadshows from 10-14 May, promoting the NGH's 'Homeworkers Hotline' - 0800 174 095. The regional roadshows will visit towns and cities across the UK including Leicester, Nottingham, Leeds, Rochdale, Manchester, Liverpool, Cardiff and Bristol. Supporting unions include KFAT, ISTC and the GPMU.

Asbestos and the law conference, Liverpool, 24 June

If you need to find out more about asbestos legal and medical issues and you are awash with cash, this Liverpool conference should be of interest to you. Attendance also helps asbestos disease sufferers - all the proceeds go to the excellent Merseyside Asbestos Victims Support Group.

USEFUL LINKS

Visit the TUC http://www.tuc.org.uk/h_and_s/ website pages on health and safety. See what’s on offer from TUC Publications and What’s On in health and safety.

Subscribe to Hazards magazine, supported by the TUC as a key source of information for union safety reps.

What’s new in the HSC/E and the European Agency.

HSE Books , PO Box 1999, Sudbury, Suffolk CO10 2WA. Tel: 01787 881165; fax: 01787 313995.

Newsletter (4,300 words) issued 23 Apr 2004

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