Tories continue with attacks on safety

The Tory government is continuing the previous coalition administration’s vicious attack on unions, workers and health and safety, the annual Hazards conference heard last month.


The acting chair of the National Hazards Campaign, Hilda Palmer, told around 350 trade unionists and safety campaigners gathered at the conference at Keele University: “We are in a fight for our lives.” 


She added that safety reps can reclaim the health and safety agenda by campaigning both inside workplaces and making common cause with campaigns in the community.


John McClean, the GMB general union’s health, safety and environment director, warned that the government’s Trade Union Bill will deny safety reps the facility time they need to carry out their role. 


And professor Andy Watterson from the University of Stirling Occupational and Environmental Health Research Group pointed out that workers continue to face significant health and safety hazards and risks. 


They also face a huge toll in occupational diseases and injuries, including new and emerging risks as well as traditional ones, and a lack of regulatory oversight, he said. But he added that working alongside campaigns opposing, for example, welfare and NHS cuts, austerity and the TTIP transatlantic trade deal, which all raise health and safety issues, “trade unions and safety reps are key players in resisting further attacks on workplace health and safety”.


www.workstress.net/help-and-info/no-health-no-safety-no-justice-work-1

www.hazardscampaign.org.uk