Tasmania’s workers deserve the strongest possible laws to keep them safe and healthy at work.
With 10,000 compensable injuries and an average of nine deaths at work every year Tasmania’s employer bodies do not have the right to argue for lower standards.
According to the Workplace Injuries Statistical Report – 2008 there were 10,017 injuries reported in 2008, 144 more than in 2007 and the third consecutive yearly increase since 1994. The injury frequency rate also increased for the first time in 15 years to 33 injuries per million hours worked.
The Tasmanian government is taking another step towards best standards by introducing a right for workers to consult their union health and safety experts at work and for those experts to enter and examine workplaces.
The Australian community has recognised the rights of workers to be represented and for discussions to occur in their workplaces, so too must Tasmanian employers. Tasmania will join every other state in the country by legislating this right. The legislation has ample provisions to prevent abuse.
For those who care to look, there is ample evidence to show that unions do add value to workplace safety, that workplaces with good consultative mechanisms get better outcomes. To deny that opportunity is to accept second best.
A London School of Economics study showed that where there is a union presence, the workplace injury rate is 24 per cent lower than where there is no union presence.[1]
A health and safety laboratory report notes: There is general support for the contention that worker participation is more effective within workplaces where trade unions provide support for workers. Similarly, unions appear to have a positive impact upon safety performance, or conversely that non union workplaces have poorer levels of safety performance.[2]
In his review of the Victorian Occupational Health and Safety Act Chris Maxwell states: All reports indicate that the unions have exercised the right of entry conservatively. My limited enquiries have not revealed any outspoken opposition from NSW employer groups. Indeed, unofficial employer comments have acknowledged the benefits which properly-qualified union officials can bring to workplaces where OHS issues are poorly understood or ignored[3].
Government research shows unionised workplaces in Australia are three times as likely to have a health and safety committee and twice as likely to have undergone a management occupational health and safety audit in the previous 12 months.[4]
In 2006 the Tasmanian State Government conducted a trial of Union Right of Entry which was highly successful and proved unions have a genuine role to play in health and safety at work. Authorised union officials visited 71 building sites for an overall total of 114 site visits. In all, 1155 breaches were identified.
Unions Tasmania urges the Legislative Council to vote for the safety of Tasmanian workers ahead of the ideology of employer organisations.
Speaking on the eve of Unions Tasmania’s presentations “Nanotechnology: The Next Asbestos?” and “Managing Electromagnetic Radiation as an OHS Risk” for Safe Work Week, Secretary of Unions Tasmania, Simon Cocker said:
“Tasmania currently has only 39 government inspectors to cover the whole state. These extra pairs of eyes are vital to improving OHS performance.”
“We have workplace injuries on the rise, an appallingly low level of compliance with asbestos regulations estimated at around 10%, and we must work together do everything we can to make our workplaces safer.”
“Tasmanian workers should be able to have the support of their union on health and safety matters just like workers do in other states.”
“Mr Dilger from the TCCI is patently wrong in saying there is no evidence to support these measures. There is plenty of it.”
“I suggest Mr Dilger works with us to improve safety rather than trotting out the same old lines based on worn out political ideology,” said Mr Cocker
Campaigns & Education | Unions Tasmania
379 Elizabeth Street, North Hobart. 7000
Ph: 03 6234 9553 | Fax: 03 6234 9505 | Mobile: 0418 372198
[1] Litwin, A., Trade unions and industrial injury in Great Britain, LSE discussion paper, DP0468, August 2000
[2] Dr Peter Shearn, Workforce Participation in the Management of Occupational Health & Safety, HSL/2005/09, Sept 2004
[3] Victorian Review of the Occupational Health & Safety Act undertaken by Chris Maxwell QC in 2003 (The Maxwell Review), page 216.
[4] Hawke, Anne & Wooden, Mark (1997), The 1995 Australian Workplace Industrial RelationsSurvey., The Australian Economic Review 30 (3), 323-328, doi: 10.1111/1467-8462.00032
Unions Tasmania Tasmanian Branch of the ACTU
