UNION FEARS DOG INTERNATIONAL SAFETY STANDARDISATION PROCESS
(Whin n. 49-50/1997)
Most of the work on the Committees of the ISO is done by business people or by members of professional bodies who are employed by private businesses, often by transnational corporations.
All this is in marked contrast to the ILO, where decisions are made on a tripartite basis by representatives of governments, workers and employers. A further aspect of ISO needs to be borne in mind. Much of the work of ISO is technical and it is conducted by Technical Committees (TC).
But recently, there has been a tendency in ISO towards policy work: ISO 9000 on quality management, ISO 14000 on environmental management, and the proposed health and safety management standard are all policy issues, a fact which is disguised by the continued use of the term Technical Committee on issues which are not technical at all.
Yet this move to setting policies which have consequences for all of society and the global society order has gone almost unnoticed and almost without comment.
The scepticism of the labour movement over the ISO and health and safety, lies between two poles. At one end of the spectrum, there is the view that the ISO should not develop such a standard at all.
The argument here is that health and safety has emerged according to national practices which have been developed over the past three decades and even further back for industries such as mining.
These practices are such that health and safety is not a management function. It is an employer responsibility to be sure, but health and safety regimes are developed at the national level through tripartite consultations between workers, governments and employers, and they are implemented in workplaces through bipartite or joint efforts at co-operation between workers and employers.
There is a fear that once a health and safety management standard is published, it will become a substitute for the regimes, rules and practices which currently constitute the essence of health and safety.
It would be easy to contend that if there is evidence that health and safety is properly managed, then there is no need for any other type of health and safety responsibility, nor for any of the other provisions which we currently enjoy, in protecting worker health and safety.
A business armed with health and safety management might well find itself free of trade challenges, reduced legal liability or whatever, but it would not necessarily protect the health and safety of workers.
In short, workers don't want health and safety to be managed, they want the threats to their health, safety and wellbeing in the workplace to be removed. They want the workplace to be a positively healthy venue, in which workers and their representatives play a vital part. At the other pole, at the other end of the spectrum of scepticism, there are a number of queries and deep concerns. The first query is over the scope of the proposed standard.
Will we get a short, simple guidance document, or will there be a large number of documents similar to those in the ISO 14000 series on environmental management? Our preference is for a short, finite document and we have to know in advance, just how finite the project would be.
The ICFTU has roughly eight concerns of what should, in principle, find its way into any ISO standard in order to reflect a proper mode of resolution of health and safety issues in the workplace, albeit from a management point of view.
ICFTU SAYS ISO SAFETY SHOULD ACCOMODATE
(WHIN - Winter 1996/97)
1. The principle of co-operation between workers and employers in the workplace as jointly responsible for the work environment, eg through joint health and safety committees or works councils;
2. The right of workers to refuse unsafe and unhealthy work;
3. The requirement of employers to provide health and safety information and training;
4. The compliance record of enterprise, ie the degree to which the enterprise has conformed to all of the relevant laws and regulations;
5. A non-worsening or grandfathering clause, whereby management is assessed on the basis of good or accepted practice in the enterprise and in the industry, together with the criterion of continuous improvement;
6. The principle of a job protection, job security and victimisation, whereby all workers get equal and maximum benefit from conditions of employment which result in high standards of health and safety in the workplace;
7. The principle of subsidiarity whereby, in the context of the proper enforcement of health and safety rules, decisions are taken at the lowest feasible level - the work area, shop or enterprise; and
8. The recognition that management must operate within the context of the government health and safety infrastructure referred to above.
(by Dave Bennett)
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