Staff water ban lifted at car plant

By Jeremy Grimaldi 

Swindon Advertiser

HONDA has been forced to back down over a water ban that enraged its workers.

The company completed the u-turn during a monthly meeting.

It comes three months after an Advertiser story highlighted opposition to rules banning water, fruit, and biscuit-based chocolate bars like Twix on the shop floor.

During the meeting, staff were told the car giant would now allow employees to drink water next to the production line, however, strict new rules governing the size and colour of the bottle have been ushered in.

Staff were told that all bottles must now be 500ml, clear in colour and have a suction cap to ensure there is no spillage.

One 36-year-old worker said he believes Honda had no choice but to back down because managers weren’t happy with the ban, and it was a huge concern for often dehydrated workers.

He said: “This is a victory for the workers because it is a basic right that has now been clawed back.

“But it never should have been in question in the first place.

“Hopefully Honda recognise that for the next time.

“It was a big mistake to bring it in, they had no choice but to change their minds, as we had guys who were just going to walk off the line in certain parts of the plant in order to rehydrate themselves.

“I can appreciate their concerns about standards, but if the executives were on the line themselves I am sure they would feel differently.”

Union representatives say they negotiated the deal through the company’s Associates Representative Council (ARC).

But they say they won’t stop until rules concerning snacks and fruit are repealed, along with the water.

Jim D’Avila, Unite union representative, believes the company had no choice but to make the u-turn as associates weren’t happy and managers weren’t enforcing the rules.

He said: “We waged a well organised campaign that secured the hearts and minds of the workers.

“In the future Honda should listen to the views of the union’s shop stewards who have proved that they speak for the workforce and not Honda senior managers.”

Julie Cameron, head of corporate communications at Honda, South Marston, said the company’s rules are to ensure a high level of cleanliness.

She said: “Associates within Honda have been jointly developing a new standard with the company regarding drinking of water next to the production line.

“Honda had previously made available ample provision of drinking water within the facility, but through discussions with workers, it was felt that access could be improved and therefore a new standard was agreed.

“There was no change to any other existing company standards.”

Earlier this year, Unite members staged demon- strations outside Honda’s South Marston plant in protest at the company standards.

 

Crisis of Health and Safety enforcement

Swindon TUC Press Release
27th April 2008

Representatives of Swindon Trades Union Council and the unions GMB, Unite and UNISON, met with Michael Wills MP to raise concerns regarding the crisis in enforcement of Health and Safety legislation, resulting from government policy. The meeting was organised as part of the programme of events taking place for Workers Memorial Day, when trades unions across the world highlight unecessary deaths and injuries in the workplace, often resulting from negligence or complete disregard by employers for the health and safety of their workers.

“Safety” Honda style

This is a letter to the Swindon Advertiser.

I am pleased to hear that Honda management is “not prepared to compromise the safety of their staff”. What comes as something of a surprise, however, is that the main threat to their health and safety comes from cake and fruit, rather than the work they do. Perhaps the company can, in the interests of transparency, publicise the statistics for accidents in the plant, including those resulting from the proliferation of crumbs throughout the workplace. Would that be too much to ask, or is such a thing not possible because it’s ‘commercial in confidence’?

It was also interesting to read a spokesperson tell us that, benevolent company that they are, all “associate related issues” (staff or workers to you and me) are discussed “through our associate representative council”. However, this is a bit of a freudian slip, not mentioning the trade union which the company is supposed to recognise. Oh no, we discuss things with our beloved ARC.

I don’t know who the spokesperson was but their knowledge of life on the factory floor does seem a trifle lacking. Running to the canteen in a 10 minute break?

By the way, how is this rule being policed? CCTV in the break areas? Searching of all staff when they leave the break areas or finish work, for the tell-tell signs of crumbs clinging to their clothing or juice stains from fruit?

No wonder workers feel that they are being treated like children.

Martin Wicks
Secretary, Swindon TUC

Union supports MP’s concerns for health and safety

21 Apr 2008

The work and pensions select committee’s report into ‘The role of the Health and Safety Commission and the Health and Safety Executive in regulating workplace health and safety’

(http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200708/cmselect/cmworpen/246/246i.pdf)

which is published today, warns that if a move to a single HSE headquarters in Bootle goes ahead there could be a significant loss of expertise as many of the current staff will be unwilling to relocate to Bootle.

Health & Safety Crisis

Swindon TUC Health & Safety Briefing

hsbriefing Download this as a PDF

Swindon TUC and local unions are meeting with Swindon MP Michael Wills on Friday April 25th to discuss what the unions consider to be a crisis in the regime of Health & Safety inspection and enforcement. We were hoping for this to take place on Workers Memorial Day but Mr Wills could not make it on that day. WMD is an event organised by the unions to commemorate workers killed and injured at work, often owing to the negligence of employers.

The importance of Health & Safety is often downplayed or has scorn poured on it by the media, identifying it with ‘PC’ (political correctness), and the odd incident such as children being prevented from playing conkers because of the risk to them.

In fact, Health & Safety is a crucial part of the work of the trades unions, which protects workers from injury, illness, and sometime death, which they suffer as a result of work. It is a well-known fact that the chance of an accident is 50% less likely to occur in a unionised workplace as compared with a non-union one.

Health & Safety legislation imposes a duty of care on employers for their workers. However, too often these responsibilities are either ignored or the workplace Health & Safety system which is in place, is shoddy. Too often union Health & Safety reps have to struggle to take advantage of their legal rights because employers obstruct their work when it costs money and takes reps away from their day job.

The Health & Safety Executive is one port of call for reps when management is obstructive. Moreover, it is responsible for investigating deaths and serious accidents. However, owing to the cuts that have been imposed by the government the HSE cannot do the job that it is supposed to do. Hazards magazine reports that:

“HSE’s desperately poor safety enforcement record just took a turn for the worse. Now 9 out of 10 major injuries don’t result in an investigation, HSE inspections have hit a new low and the last two years have seen the worst enforcement performance on record. Hazards editor Rory O’Neill says only dangerous employers now have reason to feel safe.”

The statistics are worrying:

Fatalities are Up – 241 worker deaths in 2006/07 compared to 217 in 2005/06, an 11 % increase. It should be born in mind that workers (who drive for a living) who die in road accidents are not counted as ‘workplace deaths’.

Inspections are down - 41,496 HSE inspections in 2006/07 compared to 54,717 in 2005/06, a 24 per cent decrease. In 2001 workplaces could expect a visit every 7 years, This has now risen to every 14.5 years.

Investigations down – the proportion of reported serious injuries investigated by the HSE is down to 11% in 2005/06 from 13% the previous year.

Prosecutions remain low - 1,056 offences were prosecuted by HSE in 2005/06 compared to 1,320 in 2004/05, a fall of 20 per cent. Convictions dropped by 10 per cent. Provisional figures for 2006/07 show a minor improvement in prosecutions and convictions, but the last two years remain the worst on record.

Enforcement notices remain low - notices issued by HSE in 2005/06 compared to 8,471 in 2004/05, a fall of over 22 per cent. Prohibition notices were down by 18 per cent and improvement notices by 24 per cent. The provisional total notices figure rose to 8,071 in 2006/07, but the last two years remain the worst on record.

The HSE’s ‘decision reporting forms’ reveal the number of incidents so serious investigation should follow automatically but where no investigation has occurred because of “inadequate resources” has increased from 207 in 2005/05, to 255 in 2005/06 and to 307 in 2006/07.

There are serious concerns that the enforcement crisis at HSE will worsen, as further funding cuts bite. HSE has already lost over 250 jobs since April 2006 and faces a further 100 job losses in the second half of the financial year. HSE is grappling with the news that the anticipated 15 per cent budget cut by 2011 to meet Treasury efficiency targets may in fact be larger still.

Since 2002, HSE has lost over 1,000 posts as a result of government spending cuts; HSE union Prospect says the organisation now employs fewer than 3,250 staff, down from over 4,000 when Labour took office.

These statistics indicate that HSE is an organisation which cannot cope with the amount of work it has. Government cuts mean that the overwhelming majority of serious accidents in the workplace are not being investigated. That inevitably means that negligent employers are not subject to the necessary action to call them to order and to force them to carry out their legal responsibilities.

In June 2007, the Health and Safety Commission (HSC) followed HSE’s recommendation and said there would be no new rights for safety reps, following a “consultation” in which 9 out of 10 respondents supported increasing the rights of union Health & Safety reps. The move came after the CBI “strongly opposed” the new rights, safety minister Lord McKenzie said in an 8 June 2007 letter to NUJ general secretary Jeremy Dear.

Lord McKenzie said:

“HSC cannot make changes without broad stakeholder agreement to them and the lack of consensus between the social partners on this issue means that no progress can be made on any regulatory changes.”

So there can be no changes unless the employers agree!

We believe that:

The cutbacks which have adversely impacted on the HSE should be halted, and indeed reversed.

The rights of Health & Safety reps should be reinforced.

‘Roving Reps’ (or Workers Safety Advisers) should be recognised in law.

Swindon TUC
April 13th 2008

Notes:

Workers Memorial Day is an international trade union event, taking place annually on April 28th, organised to commemorate those killed and injured needlessly in the workplace, and to campaign for effective Health & Safety legislation and a rigorous inspection regime.

See material on International Workers Memorial Day
http://www.hazards.org/wmd/index.htm

Below is material which explains the impact of negligence on the part of employers and a slack H&S regime.

Too young to dieA young worker between 16 and 24 is injured every 12 minutes, seriously injured every 40 minutes and killed every 4 weeks. Read the stories of those workers whose young lives have been needlessly cut short.
http://www.hazards.org/2young2die/index.htm

Safety repressed
Despite a consultation on the role of safety reps the government has failed to strengthen reps rights and failed to challenge the obstructions employees place in the way of reps having the time to carry out their role.
http://www.hazards.org/safetyreps/safetyrepressed.htm

Suspension Trauma Petition

Health & Safety reps from the Gloucester & North Wilts branch of the CWU (covering BT) attended the Health & Safety conference organised by Swindon TUC on February 4th. In the discussion they drew to our attention that the branch has launched a petition on the Downing Street website. It reads:

“We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to amend The Work at Height Regulations 2005 to make it law for explanatory labels to be permanently fixed to all fall arrest lanyards and safety harnesses, so rescuers understand the implications of “Suspension Trauma”.”

They explain that:

“It is possible that an otherwise fit person, saved from falling by a lanyard fall arrest system, can suffer from suspension trauma within 10 - 30 minutes while awaiting rescue. Blood can pool in the legs causing the person to slip in to unconsciousness. Most would be rescuers are not trained in suspension trauma and their normal treatment for someone who has fainted could lead to the patient’s rapid death. Labels should be permanently affixed to all safety harnesses and lanyards explaining that the patient should be treated for a “Crush injury” to prevent re-flow. They must be kept in a sitting position for at least half an hour to avoid a heart attack or severe kidney damage. This simple label could save lives, please sign this petition.”

BT engineers, of course, have to climb polls to work on lines, often working on their own.

Les Glover who originated the petition explains why.

“Suspension trauma really crept into my life in a slow unassuming way. Quite a few years ago we were trained on the use of a new harness at work to replace our old faithful safety belt that we had grown used to when climbing telephone poles.

The new harness was a pain, buckle at the chest, buckle at the waist and buckles on each thigh, then this damn lanyard connected to a ‘D’ ring on the chest. The lanyard was always getting in the way but we had to use it. The training had a very quick 2 minutes on what we had to do if we fell from the pole. The lanyard would break then completely arrest the fall to leave us suspended.

Just get back on to the pole steps we were told, if you cannot, wriggle your toes or keep your legs moving. We treated it as a bit of a joke to be truthful. the seriousness was never put across to us, I would hate to say by design so it must of been by ignorance. After that we just got on and used the new harness and lanyard (well most of us anyway).

A year or so later I heard a news item on the radio during the night when I had trouble sleeping, it concerned some rescue training where someone in a harness was in the process of helping train others to rescue him. He was uninjured and fit but he slipped in to unconsciousness. At the time I thought “Must bring this up at work” but by the time morning came I had slept for a few hours and the memory as gone.

Gone for about 3 years until I was attending a CWU safety reps course at our own union training school, Alvescott. We had just had a guest speaker, a nice guy but not really the best of speakers, he had stepped in at the last moment when the first choice was called away.

After he had left we were having an informal discussion about hazards when the memory of that radio news item came to me so I mentioned it. “Suspension Trauma” someone said and then proceeded to tell us a little more about it and how his branch had been trying to raise the issue with BT for sometime. That prompted me to go to the library after our evening meal and do a bit of googleing, what I learned that night frightened me, the fact that it was so little understood and so deadly when mishandled. Why weren’t we told more about it at work? Why were emergency services relatively ignorant of it.

I decided that this was something I could and should do something about. I had spent quite a time reading the Work at height regulation 2005 and thought that an amendment so an information tag to be fitted to harnesses and lanyards would be a good but simple way of alerting rescuers that special treatment would be required. Hence the birth of the petition.Later I made enquiries with the Great Western Ambulance service and eventually got to talk to one of their trainers, responsible for the training of paramedics, as a result they have now taken suspension trauma into their syllabus.

Change is slow but as long as we make changes for the good it will help those who normally take safety regimes as being over the top, after all when it comes to safety short cuts, the first person you are cheating is yourself.”

Please spend a little time to sign the petition which can be found at:

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Suspensiontrauma/

You can read a more detailed explanation of Suspension Trauma at:

http://www.suspensiontrauma.info/

Report slams official complacency on UK work cancer epidemic

CANCER PREVENTION COALITION NEWS RELEASE

 [25 June 2007]

Work-related cancers will claim thousands of lives each year for a further working generation as a result of the “shocking complacency” of the government’s health and safety watchdog, a new report is warning. ‘Burying the evidence’ says the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) has neither the resources nor the strategy to tackle the workplace carcinogen exposures killing at least 12,000 people each year.

The report, by Professors Andrew Watterson and Rory O’Neill of Stirling University’s Occupational and Environmental Health Research Group, says HSE’s action plan – unveiled at a London seminar on 25-26 June - omits a range of occupational cancers, grossly under-estimates the risks of others and excludes entirely some of the most high risk groups of workers.

“HSE’s recommendations for action range from complacent to non-existent,” says Professor Watterson. “Its evaluations on cancer causing substances including benzene, cadmium, diesel exhaust and wood dust are error-ridden, inadequate and outdated, whole categories of workers known to be at high risk are ignored, and HSE cannot quantify and continues to neglect the risk to women.”

Breast cancer, the major occupational and environmental cancer risk for women, “is entirely off HSE’s radar,” Professor Watterson says. “The net result of this shocking complacency will be needless exposures and avoidable deaths.”

The report puts the cost to the UK of occupational cancer deaths at between £29.5bn and £59bn a year. Preventing just 100 of these deaths a year would more than offset the entire annual HSE budget.

Report co-author Professor Rory O’Neill says: “HSE’s approach will do little or nothing to reduce either the volumes or the numbers of cancer-causing substances used in Britain’s workplaces. This guarantees a new working generation will face a preventable cancer risk.

“Asbestos still kills thousands every year and the epidemic has yet to peak. We are already seeing evidence of cancers in microelectronic workers, an industry just one working generation old, and it is anybody’s guess how work in the nanotech industry will impact on health.” Only a small proportion of industrial chemicals have been tested thoroughly for chronic health effects, he adds.

The report was prepared for the Cancer Prevention Coalition, an alliance of academics, trades unions and environmental and occupational cancer campaigners. Hilda Palmer of the Hazards Campaign, a member of the coalition, says: “Occupational cancer is not a disease of the boardroom – almost all the risk is borne by just one-fifth of the workforce. They are not told they are at risk, they are not provided health surveillance and they don’t get the early diagnosis that can be the difference between living and dying. They are not dying of ignorance; they are dying of neglect.”

‘Burying the evidence’ calls for “sunsetting” to phase out where possible many common workplace carcinogens, and a “Toxics Use Reduction” policy to help wean companies on to safer alternative substances and processes. These approaches have worked well elsewhere, and have been supported by both workplace and environmental health advocates and industry. The coalition says the UK government should recognise work-related cancers as a major public health priority.

Notes to editors

1. Burying the evidence: How the UK is prolonging the occupational cancer epidemic, by Professors Andrew Watterson and Rory O’Neill of Stirling University, can be viewed online at: www.hazards.org/cancer/hsecriticism

2. The Cancer Prevention Coalition is an alliance of safety campaign groups including the national Hazards Campaign www.hazardscampaign.org.uk, academics, unions and cancer and occupational disease support groups. It has produced an online Work Cancer Prevention Kit as part of a global “Occupational cancer/Zero cancer” campaign.

3. The Health and Safety Executive’s occupational cancer seminar is on 25-26 June 2007 at the Kensington Close Hotel, Wrights Lane, London W8 5SP

Swindon TUC Health and Safety site

Swindon TUC has set up a new site dedicated to Health & Safety issues, following the February 5th Health and safety conference we held.

You can visit the site at: http://swindontuchealthandsafety.blogspot.com

It has a report of the conference and will have H&S news posted on a regular basis. If you have any news relating to H&S or you see an article or information which you think should be posted on the site please let us know by emailing us at: swindontuc@btinternet.com

Health & Safety Conference

Swindon TUC, with the assistance of South West TUC Education Officer Marie Hughes, and the Trade Union Centre at New College, is organising a Health & Safety conference on February 5th at the Oakfield Campus of the University of Bath (in Swindon), from 09.30 am to 4 pm.The conference is for workplace Health & Safety reps, though any union activists interested in campaigning in relation to Health & Safety will be welcome.

We will be writing directly to health &safety reps and union branches shortly.

More detail about the day will follow. Please put the date in your diary.

Health & Safety Conference ?

Swindon TUC and the Trade Union Education Centre are looking to organisation a day conference for Health & Safety reps in the area. Below is the letter being sent out to union branches, together with a feedback form to guage the level of interest.

Swindon Trades Union Council, in conjunction with the Trade Union Education Centre at New College, is considering organising a one day conference for Health & Safety reps in the Swindon area.One of the most positive things about the TUC Health & Safety courses is that they provide the opportunity for reps to meet people in other unions, industries and workplaces, learning from each others experience. After they finish the Stage 1 and 2 courses, there is no framework for meeting other reps again. Some unions run their own courses so their reps never meet H&S reps from other unions.

The one day conference we would like to organise would be an opportunity to bring together H&S reps in the area to:

• Discuss contemporary issues relating to H&S law and its operation;
• Provide the opportunity for reps to report on their experience in their own workplace – successes and problems – and to learn from the experience of others.

Currently there is not a means of generalising from the work of reps in individual workplaces. If the local labour movement had more idea of common problems across workplaces, we could help H&S reps to develop ‘best practice’ in order to improve H&S in the many workplaces in the area.

We would envisage the day comprising an opening session with speakers talking about H&S policy – government policy, problems with the HSE etc - to be followed by discussions in small groups, which would provide delegates with the opportunity to discuss their workplace experience and problems in a more informal setting. These groups could report back on their discussions. A final session could discuss how useful delegates found the proceedings and what we might do together in the future.

• Should we have an annual meeting?
• Might we organise an event on Workers memorial day?
• Might there be an email information/discussion list for H&S reps in Swindon?

Other ideas may well emerge during the course of discussion.

Before we set about organising a day’s event, however, we are writing to union branches and asking them to circulate this letter to their H&S reps, together with a questionnaire (enclosed), to test out the level of interest and potential attendance. If you think the event would be useful please fill in the questionnaire and return it to us asap.

Please let us have any ideas or suggestions.

Many thanks

Martin Wicks
Secretary Swindon Trades Union Council

If you are interested in attending such a conference please email the detail requested below.

NameAddress

Union

WorkplacePhone

Email

Would you be able to arrange for release to attend on a weekday? Y / NComments (please write down any suggestions for issues that you think should be dealt with on the day or any general comments)