Category Archives: media

28 April / WMD, Blog, media

Hazards Campaign reveals the tragic price of work hazards

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Press Release for International Workers Memorial Day to remember people killed by work

For immediate release

On International Workers Memorial Day, Friday 28th April,  workers globally will hold workplace and community events to remember work colleagues, who have died because of their work.  Every year the Hazards Campaign produce ‘The Whole Story’ (1) which is an analysis of the occupational injuries, illness and deaths statistics.

In the last 12 months alone, it is estimated by the Hazards Campaign, that more than 53,000 people died because of work and this number doesn’t include the hundreds of workers who have died because of Covid infections they contracted in the workplace, because there is no obligation for employers to report them to the enforcement agency, or for them to be investigated or employers to be prosecuted.(1) and they not recorded.

The Hazards Campaign includes an estimate of the number of workers who have died from work-related suicide, which is estimated to be as high as 10% of all suicides. (2)  Again, the employer is under no legal duty to report, or investigate these deaths and this estimate is based on numbers recorded in other countries where suicides are reportable.  The Hazards Campaign believes there is a moral obligation to do this, and are campaigning for there to be a legal obligation for work-related suicides to be reportable, investigated and employers prosecuted if they are negligent.(3)

UK Hazards Campaign spokesperson Janet Newsham, said it’s shocking that worldwide, work kills a minimum of 2.9 million people every year.

She said: “Last year safe and healthy work was adopted as a fundamental right by the ILO.  This means that occupational health and safety must be central to all work.  This should also mean that our Government, employers and enforcement authorities must double their efforts to eradicate unsafe and unhealthy work activities.  It should be no longer acceptable that work drives people to take their own life, or that workers are subjected to air pollution and other airborne viruses, toxic chemicals and hazardous substances, that will eventually kill them. It should mean that these are not an optional extra but are fundamental to safe and healthy work.’

‘No-one should lose their life for just going out to work to earn a living. Too many people die because of their work activities.  On International Workers Memorial Day we will remember all those who have died because of work, we will wear purple ribbons in their memory, we will tell their stories(2), and try to hold those responsible for their deaths are held to account.  We don’t want to hear about lessons learnt, that means that someone else has died.  We need all work to be safe and healthy, preventing deaths, diseases and injuries and on April 28th we will ‘Remember the dead and Fight for the Living!’’

Note to editors:

More details on the theme can be found here:

  1. The whole story: https://sway.office.com/0SEVenHS9yTFFJqs?ref=Link
  2. Families against corporate killers 2023 statement: https://www.hazardscampaign.org.uk/blog/uk-fack-statement-international-workers-memorial-day-28-april-2023
  3. Suicide:
  4. Further information:

For more details please contact Janet Newsham on 07734 317158.

28 April / WMD, Blog, media

UK: FACK Statement – International Workers’ Memorial Day 28 April 2023

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FACK Statement

International Workers’ Memorial Day 28 April 2023

 

We FACK families are eternally grateful to each and every person who has come together today to mark International Workers’ Memorial Day.  A day when we remember all of those bereaved by work. And renew our commitment to fighting like hell for the living.

Because, just what is it to be bereaved by work…?

It’s to start a day like any other. And end it like no other. To not have known that was your last goodbye. To be left to rue the denial of so many tomorrows and still feel the ripple effects decades on.

It’s to be let down, time and again.  By the employer who had a moral duty and a legal responsibility to look after our family member, and failed in both respects in the worst possible way.  By those politicians who erroneously believe health and safety protections to be burdens on business, and seek to slash and burn where they should be seeking to safeguard and bolster.  By the enforcement authorities who seem so often incapable of effecting proactive preventative inspections.  And by our prosecution bodies, who take far too long to bring negligent employers to, what passes for, justice.

Because, to be bereaved by work is to be a victim of crime.  But to be made to feel like a lesser class of victim.  One where you’re not placed at the heart of the justice process, but left to feel you exist somewhere on the periphery.  To have to garner the strength time and again to face another battle against a justice system, which is meant to be on our side, but which all too often serves to further deepen our trauma.

It’s to question whether you yourself have done enough.  Whether you could have done more to get answers sooner.  To get action quicker. To ensure changes are implemented to prevent the heartbreak of other families like your own. But having to come to terms with the fact this is never within our own power, but reliant on others.  Others who have let us down.

The loss of our loved one’s life set off a chain reaction of change, where the lives we thought we were going to lead are no longer possible.  The wedding day that didn’t happen.  The child who didn’t survive their apprenticeship.  The future mapped out with your partner of 28 years now a solo challenge, rather than a team adventure.  The sibling you can no longer call for advice, or look to for support.

It’s also about facing poverty through the loss of a breadwinner’s income or losing your own job, house, livelihood, as you grieve for your loved one and are unable to work to sustain yourself and your family. Compensation is often not made at all, or is too little, and the benefits system is very harsh and support very scarce. The effects of a work death can resonate painfully through generations.

It’s to feel a devastation you never thought possible.  And other times to feel numb, a nothing-ness, a lack of hope.  When you see another news report of a death due to a so-called “accident” at work, it’s to not just understand what that actually means, but to feel it.

What else is it to be bereaved by work….?

It’s to find lifelong friends you will cherish, all the while wishing you had met in altogether different circumstances.

It’s to find the voice you never knew you had.  The one which, though it may occasionally tremble, steadies itself to assertively speak truth to power. To find that strength you never ever expected to need.

And though you are let down at too many turns, you are lifted by the fortitude and support of others. Like those who work and volunteer in the Hazards movement, Hazards Centres, and charity Scottish Hazards.  Like the trade unionists who help ensure their workplaces are safer and healthier. And like those individual politicians, enforcers, prosecutors and others who do get it, who do understand what we are going through, and who want desperately to bring about the changes we need to see.

We need the employers who do care to guide, educate and cajole those who need woken up to their responsibilities. Laws to be protected. An end to the odious practice of blacklisting. We need enforcement before the fact.  Lessons to be learned, communicated and actioned before loss of life occurs. Penalties that fit the crime. Those bereaved by work to be placed at the heart of the justice system.  And for no other family to have to walk in our families’ shoes.

So, we will continue to tell our loved ones’ stories. We will continue to lay bare our reality.

All in the desperate hope and eternal expectation that we’ll be able to prevent others going through the turmoil of those of us left behind.  Our loved one went to work to make a better life.  Instead, there was loss of life and lives forever altered.

We FACKers pledge to you is to continue to live the International Workers’ Memorial Day mantra each and every day, as we forever remember our dead, and do our damndest to fight like hell for the living.

FACK was established in July 2006, by and for families of people killed by the gross negligence of business employers, to sit with families in the darkest hour and help them speak truth to power, see www.fack.org.uk  https://gmhazards.org.uk/index.php/fack/      Facebook:  Families Against Corporate Killers

Founder Members of FACK:

Dawn and Paul Adams – son Samuel Adams aged 6 killed at Trafford Centre,10th October 1998

Linzi Herbertson – husband Andrew Herbertson 29, killed at work on 30th January 1998

Mike and Lynne Hutin – son Andrew Hutin 20, killed at work on 8th Nov 2001

Mick & Bet Murphy – son Lewis Murphy 18, killed at work on 21st February 2004

Louise Adamson – brother Michael Adamson 26, killed at work on 4th August 2005

Linda Whelan – son Craig Whelan 23, (and Paul Wakefield) killed at work on 23rd May 2004

Dorothy & Douglas Wright – son Mark Wright 37, killed at work on 13th April 2005

For more information and to support FACK, contact Hilda Palmer, Facilitator for FACK: Tel 0161 792 1044

c/o GM Hazards Centre/Hazards Campaign, Windrush Millennium Centre,

70 Alexandra Road, Manchester M16 7WD Tel 0161 792 1044

mail@gmhazards.org.uk  www.fack.org.uk https://gmhazards.org.uk/index.php/fack/

media

The HSE needs to be bold, and ambitious on PFAS – Hazards Campaign

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Press Release: For immediate release – 5/4/23

The Hazards Campaign welcomes the regulatory management options analysis (RMOA) report from Health and Safety Executive (HSE) on per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS) (1), announced on the 4th April, as a step forward from the unacceptable and alarming situation in the UK.  However, it is predicated on the pretence that the UK can independently make different decisions than the rest of EU or even globally and it not matter.

Janet Newsham, Chair UK Hazards Campaign said: ‘We have a global PFAS crisis.  These ‘forever chemicals’ have seeped into every facet of our environment and human existence.  They are inhaled and absorbed into our bodies and spread via our blood and cause serious and irreversible harm to our health.  Furthermore, they are not restricted by artificial borders, meaning doing something less than the rest of the EU is futile in the fight to arrest the harm.

If as much money was spent tracking and controlling PFAS use, as is spent on supporting industries who are responsible for their production, then we would have known about the dangers long ago.’

The Hazards Campaign’s position is supported by international chemicals policy experts Sara Brosché and Rory O’Neill, both Bureau members for the UN’s Strategic Approach to International Chemicals Management (SAICM).

Dr Sara Brosché, a science adviser with the International Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN), said:  “It is welcome to see that the HSE recommendations is focusing on regulating broader groups of PFAS, which underscores the urgent need to ban PFAS as a class globally. However, such an effort should rather be based on the recent EU restriction proposal that would see thousands of perfluorinated chemicals severely restricted. These toxic ‘forever chemicals’ are linked to severe health impacts and are already polluting virtually all humans and environments.”

Queen Mary University of London occupational health prof Rory O’Neill agrees.  “The recommendations from HSE are welcome but limited. These are not just ‘forever chemicals’, they are a serious risk to human health, linked to reproductive hazards, cancers and major organ damage. Much more extensive and serious restrictions are warranted.”

Hazards Campaign, Janet Newsham said ‘The UK has decided to disassociate itself from EU REACH with scant consideration to the research, investigations and decisions that are needed on chemical and other toxic substances.  This has meant we have been left with a second rate decision making process.  One that excludes transparency and worker representation at its centre.

The EU proposal to restrict PFAS covers more than 10,000 substances.(4)  For UK workers the HSE RMOA relies on poorly enforced COSHH legislation to protect workers and an HSE that runs scared of regulation.

There are better ways to regulate and control PFAS and other toxic substances.  One suggestion would be to remain part of the EU Reach programme, which has greater resources, trade union and worker scrutiny.  But the political bile of the Brexit lobby makes that unwelcome and unlikely.

As a result, we are left with little scrutiny or influence on the decisions that the HSE make, and an HSE under-resourced and lacking in the essential expertise to make informed decisions, looking for easy solutions that will leave workers in harms way.
The HSE report plays down the cancer risks, which are taken more seriously in the equivalent EU report. [European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) REACH dossier for the universal PFAS restriction on page 30, first para, version 2, 22 March 2023].  (4)

Although the HSE RMOA claims it bases its recommendations on the precautionary principle (page 9)(1), it fails to take a precautionary approach to “probable” carcinogens, and there are currently no Workplace Exposure Limits (WEL) for any PFAS because the analysis takes the view that there is ‘uncertainty with regard to human health hazard profiles of the various groups as well as the use in the workplace.  This seems contradictory to a precautionary approach.’

Whilst we welcome the RMOA, it is clearly too little, toothless and likely to continue to result in workers, our communities and the environment still exposed to PFAS and the health consequences will be dire for many of us.

But it wont end there, we will be exposing our children to continued and increasing exposure to a toxic soup of chemicals: carcinogens, mutagens, endocrine disrupting chemicals and reproductive toxic substances.

The HSE needs to be bold, and ambitious, not weak and ineffective!’

Additional resources:

  1. Press release from the HSE, 4 April 2023: Regulator’s report on “forever chemicals” published
  2. UK NGOs statement on PFAS, published in May 2022 and signed by 35 organisations: Case for urgent, group-based, regulation to prevent continued PFAS pollution in the UK environment
  3. ECHA publishes PFAS restriction proposal April, 2023
  4. ECHA proposal for restriction
Further information:

1.  Hazards Magazine on Chemicals

2.  Eliminating Toxic Substances at Work GMHC website

3.  Hazards Campaign Website

For more information:
Janet Newsham – Chair UK Hazards Campaign
janet@gmhazards.org.uk
07734317158

Blog, media

It’s not just our liberties at stake, but our lives!

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Press Release: For immediate release – 7.10.22

Today is the ITUC World Day for Decent Work (1).  Decent work is a hallmark of a progressive society, but the Governments actions this week show they don’t want it, wont police it, and thinks workers shouldn’t have the power to defend it.

Workers are facing ever rising, unrelenting workloads, never ending working hours, with emails and phone calls at all times of the day and night, a disappearing work/life balance and hundreds of thousands of workers off sick with mental ill health and long-covid disabilities.

The latest proposed bonfire of employment and health and safety regulations of everything that originated in the EU and the shackling of trade unions, will place workers enslaved in low paid, dangerous unhealthy work at the behest of unscrupulous employers.  At a time when modern slavery is increasing, the 5th richest nation Government could be adding to it.

None of us voted to die at work, but the policies of this government will mean an increasing number of us will.  They will die because they cannot afford to give up work to retire, they will die because of the stress of having to work multiple jobs to pay their mortgages or energy bills, they will die because their employer will not have to assess and control the risks to their health and safety, they will die in their communities from exposure to toxic substances or unleashed viruses.

This Government are choosing not to value the lives of ordinary working people and at the same time ‘raiding’ the public purse to reduce the tax burden on the wealthy, without any scrutiny or electoral mandate.

They are about to plunge us into more despair.  They are coming after our working conditions, our safety at work and our future health.  And if they succeed, they will let bad employers determine the number of working hours people work, whether they will pay for holidays, whether we have maternity leave or sick pay, the ability to retain contracts when our organisations are outsourced, to name a few.  There could be no standard for the PPE provided by employers when we work with hazardous substances, no right to have it provided free by your employer, no minimum standards of welfare at work.  They will literally be able to work us to death!  As Rory O’Neill says in the Hazards Magazine (2) they have ‘plans for a lawless, dangerous and disposable worker UK plc!

At the heart of decent jobs and decent lives, workers need a health and safety system with strong laws, strict enforcement and strong, organised, and active trade unions.

Ref:
(1) www.wddw.org
(2) www.hazards.org

For more information:
Janet Newsham – Chair UK Hazards Campaign
janet@gmhazards.org.uk
07734317158

Blog, media

News release: The Hazards Campaign rejects the political hijacking of the HSE

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11 September 2022: For immediate release

The Hazards Campaign rejects the political hijacking of the HSE

On the 50th anniversary of the Robens Report it is shameful that the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions has chosen this year to put the final nail in the coffin of tripartism.

The UK Hazards Campaign is deeply concerned at the political hijacking of the Health and Safety enforcement (HSE) authority, which again has rejected a representative nominated from the TUC on to the HSE Board, which replaced the HSC.

The HSE has become an organisation which at worst, no longer operates as a tripartite organisation or at best only pretends to operate as one.  The principles of tripartism were fundamental to ensuring that workers voices are heard and their concerns about health and safety risks are represented at every level of the HSE organisation including board level 1.

The Robens report, which established the Health and Safety at Work Act 1974 (HSWA), is 50 this year– It set up the Health and Safety Commission, HSC, to agree any new regulations and oversee the Health and Safety Executive, HSE, enforcement of health and safety at work, on tripartite principles2.

Working effectively with business, workers and government to keep workers safe, no decision could be made without the support of both employers and employee representatives. This meant that any changes to health and safety law were seen to have come about by consensus, achieved through a common purpose of improving health and safety in the workplace.

This can no longer be the case if the Government refuses to accept those people that the TUC or other trade unions with due diligence legitimately nominate.  It is also becoming apparent that the HSE are withdrawing their involvement from the industrial committees, which also operate on a tripartite basis.

The UK Hazards Campaign, urges the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, to reverse this dangerous and politically motivated path and return the HSE to its independent tripartite origins.

Further information:

  1. So much for the Robens vision of health and safety 08 May 2013, By Kevin Rowan https://strongerunions.org/2013/05/08/so-much-for-the-robens-vision-of-health-and-safety/
  2. Briefing: Work and Health: 50 years of regulatory failure – IER   https://www.ier.org.uk/publications/briefing-work-and-health-50-years-of-regulatory-failure/
  3. Hazards, number 153, 2021 – RUBBED OUT | HSE bosses are the only ones that think it’s doing a good job https://www.hazards.org/infections/rubbedout.htm

For More Information:
Janet Newsham
janet@gmhazards.org.uk
07734317158

Blog, media

UK Hazards Campaign welcomes the new ILO Fundamental Right on health and safety at work and demands UK Government act now

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Press Statement For Immediate Release

14 June 2022.

UK Hazards Campaign welcomes the new ILO Fundamental Right on health and safety at work and demands UK Government action to implement it, save lives and livelihoods.

On 10th June a historic announcement was made to introduce a fifth fundamental principal and right at work with the right for workers to a healthy and safe working environment.  It is the first extension of workers’ rights in 25 years. (1)

This stands alongside those Fundamental principles and rights at work, originally adopted in 1998:

  1. Freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining
  2. The elimination of forced or compulsory labour
  3. The effective abolition of child labour
  4. The Elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation. And now
  5. Right to a healthy and safe working environment

The main aim of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) is to promote rights at work, encourage decent employment opportunities, enhance social protection and strengthen dialogue on work related issues.  It is the only tripartite UN Agency and has been in existence since 1919 when the ILO was formed.

This significant development has only been possible with the dedication and hard work of individuals across the globe and we congratulate and thank them for their fortitude and relentless pursuit of decent work that is safe and healthy and that will benefit all of society.

The fundamental right to safe and healthy work was the major theme of this year’s International Workers Memorial Day as we remembered all those people who die in the UK because of exposure to toxic and hazardous substances and work activities.

Every year in the UK more than 50,000 people die because of work activities and because their employers have failed to control the risks to their health and safety. (2)  This is both immoral and makes no economic sense to the UK economy, to our health care systems and to the commercial interests of organisations.  Every death is cost to individuals, to communities and to society in general.  This needs to be addressed and reduced.  Covid-19 has led to the deaths of more than 20,000 workers.  Deaths that should and could have been avoided with employers taking a precautionary approach to the risks.

This Thursday 16.6.22 is ‘Clean Air Day’ and the Hazards Campaigns TUCAN (Trade Union Clean Air Network) is holding an event to discuss the harm that toxic and polluted air is causing workers, their community and families.  According to the Govt, air pollution is the largest environmental risk to public health, killing between 28,000 and 36,000 deaths every year. (3)   However, little is done to protect the health of workers exposed inside and outside the workplace every day and everyone should have the right to not be harmed because of their work.

“No-one should be exposed to polluted air, be injured, develop occupational diseases or die because of work.  The vast majority of these are foreseeable and preventable.  Workplace harm is a blight on our society and for our families and loved ones.”

The Hazards Campaign calls on the UK government to ensure the safety and health of all workers as outlined in ILO conventions 155 and 187 and to agree to support their recommendations in UK law, including in trade agreements, international financing rules and in the global supply chains.

“Having the International Labour Organisation, a United Nations body with representation from governments, employers and workers organisations, agree the right to safe and healthy work as a fundamental right globally is an amazingly significant event and those who have achieved it deserve applause.  However, this right does not apply in the same way EU Directives or national laws do and we will have to fight to ensure our government (and many others) do what is necessary to meet the spirit of this right. What is clear is that it will be a useful tool in the fight against the de-regulators and those who hide de-regulation in secret international trade deals but we will have to learn exactly how it may be used in those fights in the months and years to come.”

For more information Please see:

  1. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/air-pollution-applying-all-our-health/air-pollution-applying-all-our-health#:~:text=The%20annual%20mortality%20of%20human,and%2036%2C000%20deaths%20every%20year.
  2. https://www.ilo.org/global/about-the-ilo/newsroom/news/WCMS_848132/lang–en/index.htm
  3. https://gmhazards.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/The-Whole-story-2022.pdf

For more information, press only:
Contact: Janet Newsham
Email: janet@gmhazards.org.uk
Tel: 07734317158
www.hazardscampaign.org.uk

The Hazards Campaign is a UK-wide network of resource centres and campaigners. The Hazards Campaign supports those organising and campaigning for justice and safety at work.

Contact details:
The Hazards Campaign
c/o Greater Manchester Hazards Centre
Windrush Millennium Centre
70 Alexandra Road
Manchester,
M16 7WD
ENGLAND

website www.hazardscampaign.org.uk
twitter @hazardscampaign
facebook www.facebook.com/groups/123746101003963

Blog, media

The party’s over – the Hazards Campaign calls on the Government to reverse their deadly Covid-19 policies

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News bulletin for immediate release – 28 January 2022 No embargo

Delegates at the Friday 28 January meeting of the Hazards Campaign demand action, from the Government to enforce existing occupational safety law and prosecute employers that break the law, and to reverse their abandonment of occupational public health mitigation.

The latest statistics from Government show a huge number of workplace outbreaks. (1)

The Covid crisis in the UK has been led by a government that not only admits to breaking Covid law, but also abdicates all responsibility for controlling transmission of this deadly virus.

Janet Newsham of Hazards Campaign said: “The Hazards Campaign continues to support workers and trade union reps in untangling the confused, unscientific, unsafe and unlawful government guidance, apparently produced to force workers and others into unsafe and unhealthy workplaces, without adequate risk assessments and appropriate control measures. “

Newsham continued: “One example of this flawed approach can be found in the Department of Education operational guidance that tells employers to ignore Risk Assessments that call for remote working and allows the removal of face coverings/masks. This flies in the face of all reason and seriously jeopardises safety.” (2)

Enforcement through the pandemic has been woeful. There has been a complete absence of Covid-19 prosecutions by the HSE/Local Authority inspectors.  Lots of employers have failed to prevent infections and the result has been the deaths and long-term ill health of workers.  RIDDOR reports have been submitted in far too few cases of Covid-19 deaths, infections and for those workers who continue to suffer debilitating ill health, and no prosecutions have been made on the lack of RIDDOR reports either.

Therefore the Hazards Campaign calls for:

1. Full and proper enforcement of health and safety law as the paramount protective law at work.
2.  The prosecution of employers putting workers lives at risk.
3.  A reversal of the abdication of the Governments Covid-19 mitigation policy and the return of Plan B.
4. The development of an agreed plan with trade unions to provide safe workplaces for all workers through collective scientifically proven layered preventions.

No-one should be harmed or made ill simply going to work, especially when the mitigations to prevent infections are known.

Workers should not have to fight for their health, lives and livelihoods in a global viral pandemic when there are laws intended to protect them at work.

Notes to Editors

(1) Weekly national Influenza and COVID-19 surveillance report Week 3 report (up to week 2 data) 20 January 2022 https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1048531/Weekly_Flu_and_COVID-19_report_w3.pdf
(1) Higher education COVID-19 operational guidance
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/1048605/180122_Higher_education_COVID-19_operational_guidance.pdf

Other relevant information:

  1.  Return to work controlling the risks: https://gmhazards.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Covid-19-Controlling-risks-in-the-workplace.pdf
  2. Ventilation information – https://www.hazards.org/infections/venting.htm
  3. Hazards Campaign event – What next for workers after Plan B? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5srlOq1o4e4
  4. Hazards Campaign recordings: https://www.facebook.com/Hazards-Campaign-online-recordings-and-podcasts-225138836151169

Links

For More Information
Janet Newsham
janet@gmhazards.org.uk
07734317158

Additional Information
Website www.hazardscampaign.org.uk
Twitter @hazardscampaign
Facebook www.facebook.com/groups/123746101003963

The Hazards Campaign is a UK-wide network of resource centres and campaigners. The Hazards Campaign supports those organising and campaigning for justice and safety at work

Blog, Hazards conference, media

Hazards Conference 2021: Over 300 union reps signed up to fight for the right to safe and healthy work

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  • Over 300 union reps and safety activities will hear a powerful global line-up of speakers.
  • The conference is a must for anyone keen to know more about how to make work safer for everyone, keep health and safety failings in the spotlight and maintain a clear focus on fixing the broken system.
  • Workshop topics will include asbestos, organising, sex and gender sensitive safety, hybrid working, investigating accidents, workplace justice, surveillance and violence.
News bulletin for immediate release – 30 July 2021 – No embargo

On 31st July and 1st August, more than 300 trade union safety reps and health and safety campaigners, will participate in the online Hazards Conference under the banner of Fighting for the Fundamental Right to Safe and Healthy work. Sign up here.

Chair of the conference Doug Russell USDAW National Health and Safety officer said

“It is a great pleasure to be asked to chair the opening session. The organisers have made a virtue out of the need for a virtual conference by organising a powerful global line-up of speakers. The pandemic has exposed major problems with health and  safety and has had a devastating impact on mental and physical health of workers. The afternoon sessions and workshops on Sunday offer practical insight into how safety representatives can organise to tackle these issues. A great reality check for reps in a world that has gone mad – don’t miss it.”

And Shelly Asquith TUC National Health and Safety officer said

“Hazards Campaign has for many years exposed the dangers of unsafe work. As the pandemic rages on, it is one of the most important campaigns of our time. This weekend’s conference is a must for anyone keen to know more about how we make work safer for everyone.”

Sharan Burrow, General Secretary of the global trade union confederation ITUC, is the keynote speaker at the opening session on Saturday and will spell out why health and safety must be recognised worldwide as an ILO Fundamental Right at Work. (1)

Richard Wagstaff, New Zealand Council of Trade Unions President will speak on the safety lessons learned recently in New Zealand with particular focus on Covid-19. (2)

Andy McDonald, Labour’s shadow Employment Secretary, is the keynote speaker at the Sunday session and will speak about how decent work supports safe and healthy working environments and lives. (3)

Also at the conference Shavanah Taj, Wales TUC General Secretary will say:

“Health and safety at work is a fundamental right. Yet the crisis over the last 16 months has repeatedly demonstrated that for many workers this right is a fiction.

“In Wales we have seen clear evidence that a decade of austerity and cuts has left us unable to enforce the most basic measures to keep workers safe.

“So it’s more vital than ever that we keep health and safety failings in the spotlight and maintain a clear focus on fixing our broken system”

More information about the conference and about registering to attend it, can be found at http://www.hazardscampaign.org.uk/blog/category/hazards-conference

Links:
1. ITUC Sharan Burrow on fundamental rights – https://www.ituc-csi.org/experts-call-for-occupational-health-and-safety
2. New Zealand Council of Trade Unions – https://union.org.nz/safer-sick-leave-starts/
3. New deal for working people in LabourList https://labourlist.org/2021/07/our-new-deal-for-working-people-will-deliver-rights-and-strengthen-unions/

For More Information
Janet Newsham
janet@gmhazards.org.uk
07734317158

Additional Information
Website www.hazardscampaign.org.uk
Twitter @hazardscampaign
Facebook www.facebook.com/groups/123746101003963

The Hazards Campaign is a UK-wide network of resource centres and campaigners. The Hazards Campaign supports those organising and campaigning for justice and safety at work

Blog, media

HSE unmasked: Hazards Campaign protest today over HSE’s failure to protect workers from the airborne spread of Covid-19

2 Comments
  • Hazards Campaign is protesting HSE failures to ensure proper protection for workers against the airborne spread of Covid-19 on 27th July, 6pm at Health and Safety Executive, Bootle
  • HSE must mandate the provision of respiratory protective equipment to FFP3 standard for all NHS and social care staff.
  • A simultaneous protest has been organised by Doctors in Unite that  is taking  place at the Department of Health, London more details

News bulletin for immediate release – 27.7.21 – No embargo

The UK Hazards Campaign has organised a protest at the HSE offices in Bootle today Tuesday, 27th July over HSE’s failure to ensure proper protection against airborne transmission to health and social care staff and other workers during the continuing pandemic. A simultaneous protest has been organised by Doctors in Unite that is taking  place at the Department of Health, London more details.

The Hazards Campaign is protesting at the continued refusal of the Health and Safety Executive to stand up for, and enforce workers’ health and safety, at its failing to insist Public Health England improve their guidance to mandate the provision of respiratory protective equipment to FFP3 standard for all NHS and social care staff, and other workers rather than claiming surgical masks are PPE which it knows is not true.

Janet Newsham UK Hazards Campaign chair says,

“With the disappearing Covid-19 public protection, workers need to be properly protected and their employers have a legal duty to ensure workers health and safety and anyone else affected by their work activity or in their work premises.

“The HSE has a legal duty to ensure safe working conditions for all workers,  but they have largely failed to ensure that employers in all settings  are controlling the infection risks to their staff through their duty to provide suitable and sufficient risk assessments and adequate controls of this airborne disease.  By reacting too late hundreds of thousands of workers have been infected, many left with long-covid and some have sadly died.

“As long as employers fail to ensure adequate ventilation and a proper precautionary level of face masks, workers will continue to be exposed to Covid-19 virus.”

The socially distanced protest will take place at 6pm at the HSE offices on Merton Road, Bootle, L20 7HS

Further Information / References

1. Covid is in the millions of small airborne aerosols that infected people exhale into shared air wherever people are mixing for work, so there is even more need for all workers to have PPE  to FFP2 and FFP3 standard to protect them from infection at work,
See VENTING | Coronavirus risks are mostly up in the air – Hazards magazine
2. The HSE knows that fluid resistant surgical masks are not PPE as their 2008 Research Report RR619 Evaluating the protection afforded by surgical masks (hse.gov.uk) showed.
Main Findings –This study focused on the effectiveness of surgical masks against a range of airborne particles. Using separate tests to measure levels of inert particles and live aerosolised influenza virus, our findings show that surgical masks provide around a 6-fold reduction in exposure. Live viruses could be detected in the air behind all surgical masks tested. By contrast, properly fitted respirators could provide at least a 100-fold reduction.
3. https://www.unitetheunion.org/news-events/news/2021/july/doctors-in-unite-holds-protest-in-london-tomorrow-over-lack-of-enhanced-ppe-for-health-and-social-care-staff/

For More Information
Janet Newsham
janet@gmhazards.org.uk
07734317158

Additional Information
Website www.hazardscampaign.org.uk
Twitter @hazardscampaign
Facebook www.facebook.com/groups/123746101003963

The Hazards Campaign is a UK-wide network of resource centres and campaigners. The Hazards Campaign supports those organising and campaigning for justice and safety at work

 

Blog, media

FACK Statement: Some justice for Ben Wylie’s family after seven years but much heartbreak

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Immediate use 16.3.21

FACK Statement on the sentencing of Ruislip Plant Ltd for the offence that led to Ben Wylie’s death

Some justice for Ben Wylie’s family after seven years but much heartbreak

Mylene Bensley read her Victim Personal Statement to Reading Crown Court yesterday, before the sentencing of the company which pleaded guilty to a health and safety offence that led to the incident that killed her beloved son Ben on a construction site on 14 May 2014.

Ben was killed when stepping forward to help colleagues struggling to get a drilling rig functioning again after a part that had failed the day before had been repaired, altered and refitted, rather than replaced with a new part. When tested, the repair failed under pressure and Ben was hit by a jet of highly pressurised hydraulic oil.  Ben suffered a severe chest injury which killed him but not immediately.

In her statement Mylene said:

“Ben was such a wonderful person full of life and he filled a room when he walked in everyone loved him. Ben had many friends and a few close friends. Rhys and Karah his brother and sister meant so much to Ben he always made the effort to be there for their birthdays and special occasions. and they loved him so much”

“Ben’s death was not immediate, and I will have the visions of my son standing up after being shot by oil and a piece of equipment and stumbling across a building site saying he felt sick and spewing out blood and then falling down forever etched into my mind, due to the inadequate provision for his safety.”

“The information started coming through in graphic minutia of detail of how Ben died. I took each blow of information because my son had taken the blow that killed him, and I wanted to be there in my mind in any way I could be because I couldn’t be there for his dying moments. Ben’s body was returned home on my birthday in a coffin.”

“We have suffered for seven years with no government assistance and a sham of justice we have to continue despite anger, Deep hurt and insecurity. I am so grateful that FACK and Hilda were so helpful because without Hilda’s help and support this whole horrible experience would have been so much worse.”

“I was asked to identify my son in Maidenhead and as I had no money, I had to rely on someone’s good will to get me there. Seeing my son lying there dead was the worst sight in the world to me. All the hopes and dreams of the future gone and now my son who experienced a terrible death just lying there. I didn’t want to leave him in that cold place and I had to be escorted out.”

There were several companies on site including Ben’s employer, but it took seven years to bring the case against only one, Ruislip Plant Ltd. Thomas Kearney, the sole director carried out the botched repair, but died in 2019. His son David, who bears no responsibility for the incident or charge, with some honour did not liquidate the company and so it had assets to stand trial and pay this fine.

Yesterday the company pleaded guilty to a charge under the Health and Safety at Work etc.

The Judge fined the company £99,000 plus £116,800 costs..

Hilda Palmer FACK facilitator said:

“Families Against Corporate Killers welcome the sentence but note that justice delayed so long is always to some extent justice denied.  FACK has supported Mylene throughout the HSE investigation, the Inquest and the trial. There is no automatic statutory support for families of those killed by employer’s negligence, no free legal representation at Inquest, and no financial compensation for the family of a young man without dependents to offset the costs of pursuing justice or coping with the effects of grief on health and earning capacity. Families suffer terribly. Mothers like Mylene suffer the most and siblings also suffer badly. None of this is accounted for or deemed worthy of support and help by the authorities or employers who cause preventable deaths like Ben’s.  And since work-related death is little acknowledged, publicised or understood, many employers and even friends and family have no idea of the trauma suffered, the callous cruelty of the process or its costs to individual’s harmed due to no fault of their own but an employer failing to comply with health and safety law. The harms caused included the lack of financial or mental health support immediately or over the very long period it affects those grieving a traumatic death, and long-term impact of bereavement on parents and siblings.  FACK believes that many bereaved families suffer undiagnosed and untreated PTSD and we demand more help for families to alleviate their suffering. FACK commends Mylene for her bravery in pursuing justice for Ben, being his witness, while also being the bread winner, caring for his sister and brother and coping with her own grief. She is truly courageous and inspiring.

“Mylene spoke to the Court powerfully and eloquently about the terrible impact of Ben’s death and the effects on her and Ben’s brother and sister. This is a long-term effect, nearly eight years of severe grief and hardship to get this conviction and some justice, but a life-time of loss and heartbreak to endure. FACK has heard these words many times but we still weep and rage. We urge everyone to heed them and demand more help, support and understanding from the authorities and all concerned. We also demand that employers take health and safety seriously, do not cut corners for profit or bodge repairs to save money and time, but fully protect the lives and health of all workers and that the Health and Safety Executive enforces health and safety more stringently to prevent workers being killed. Employers do not bear the full cost, it is families who bear the burden of employers’ criminal acts.”

After the sentencing Mylene added

“It was good to give Hilda and FACK the recognition today, whilst reading my witness impact statement. The efforts and support Hilda, in particular, provided for me throughout these seven years since Ben was killed, have enabled me to pursue justice.  As I sat in virtual Reading court, through the prosecution of Ruislip Ltd, I knew I was there due to Hilda’s support. Thank you Hilda and FACK.“

Contact Hilda Palmer 0161 792 1044 mobile 079298 00240 for more information

Notes for editors

The Charge: Ruislip Plant Ltd of Ruislip Middlesex on 13th May 2014 at West Street, Maidenhead being an employer within the meaning of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 (“the Act”), it failed to discharge the duty imposed on it by section 3(1) of the Act, in that it failed to conduct its undertaking, namely the maintenance of a high-pressure grease system, in such a way as to ensure, so far as was reasonably practicable, that persons not in its employment who may have been affected thereby, including Benjamin Wylie, were not thereby exposed to risks to their health or safety, namely hydraulic injection injury during maintenance, whereby it is guilty of an offence contrary to Section 33(1)(a) of the Act.

FACK – set up in 2006 by families bereaved by negligent employers to support families, campaign for justice and end preventable work-related deaths

https://gmhazards.org.uk/index.php/fack/

In her statement Mylene said:

“I turned to a group called Families Against Corporate Killers run by Greater Manchester Hazards Centre which supports the families of those killed at work. Through them I managed to obtain advice on the process, support and also free legal representation through Helen Clifford Solicitor for the whole of the Inquest, plus some funding to stay in Reading as I had no other means of ensuring I could even be there. There is no statutory help at all for people in my position. Thank you, Hilda, and FACK for your tireless efforts at gaining accountability for workers in unsafe corporate organisations. Without your support the whole terrible experience would have been so much more difficult.”

c/o GM Hazards Centre, Windrush Millennium Centre, 70 Alexandra Road,

Manchester M16 7WD Tel 0161 792 1044 hilda@gmhazards.org.uk  https://gmhazards.org.uk/index.php/fack/