World Day for Safety and Health at Work–and in mining

Today is the official World Day for Safety and Health at Work.  The International Labour Organization is the sponsoring organization, as it has been since 2001.

The event is:

“rooted in Workers’ Memorial Day, started in 1989 by American and Canadian trade unions to commemorate dead and injured workers annually. The first year a world day for safety and health at work was held in its present form was 2003 (EU0305201N), when the ILO used it to promote the concept of creating and sustaining a safety and health culture at work - a theme that was continued in 2004.  The events that take place every year include speeches given by leaders from government, employers’ organisations and trade unions, street theatre and ‘worker coffee mornings’ focusing on occupational safety and health as well as podium discussions between eminent specialists in the field and launches of new technical and legal material related to occupational safety and health.”

From a 2005 paper from the ILO:

The ILO estimates that some 2.2 million women and men around the world succomb to work-related accidents or diseases every year. Worldwide, there are around 270 million occupational accidents and 160 million victims of work-related illnesses annually. A special ILO report, called “Prevention: A global strategy” has been prepared especially for the World Day on Safety and Health at Work According to the ILO, deaths due to work-related accidents and illnesses represent 3.9 per cent of all deaths and 15 per cent of the world’s population suffers a minor or major occupational accident or work-related disease in any one year. A large number of the unemployed – up to 30 per cent – report that they suffer from an injury or disease dating from the time at which they were employed. The unemployed often cite impairment of their health as a hindrance to finding new employment.

The radio, CBC2, this morning broadcast interviews with mothers whose under twenty sons had died in workplace accidents. The statement that changed me from sad to furious was this: “Many young people are afraid to speak out about what they think are unsafe practices because they fear they will loose their job.”

Her son did not speak out and he lost his life.

If you are very smart and can navigate a complex system (I cannot), at this link you will find my beliefs about the rules that should have been in place to keep her son alive. Here is what I link to, lest you, like me, are baffled by these modern ways.

I stick my head out by stating my belief that significant progress to a zero-fatality mining industry will not be achieved in countries where there is no democracy or, at least, strong labor unions or representation. Safety is everybody’s personal responsibility. Management can only provide the training, the systems and the procedures that enable each and every miner to work safely and stay alive. If workers are cogs, controlled and powerless, they cannot take responsibility for their own safety, and they will continue to die.

It is all too easy to write this.  It is all too difficult to expect a 19-year old to speak up when he fears to loose his first job.  It is all too much to even expect a 19-year old to recognize an unsafe condition.  This is where management, the union, the labor representative, and the international community must play a strong role. 

Let us hope they do.  Let us support them in so doing.  And let me hope I do not hear sad tales in the morning on the radio again, ever.