Worker Safety

In any dispute involving the NSW Government, the temptation is to assume that the NSW Government is 100 per cent in the wrong. It just saves time.

The stand-off between Premier Kristina Keneally and Prime Minister Julia Gillard over industrial relations reform is a bit more complicated than that.

Keneally might be out of step with other Labor Governments and the Commonwealth in refusing to accept what are modest and sensible reforms to work safety laws. But Gillard has been found wanting both in terms of her capacity for effective and sincere negotiation. She also looks like she tricked the voters by claiming during the federal election campaign that a deal had been done with the states to wind back the excesses of work safety laws, saving business millions of dollars, when it is now quite obvious that no such deal had been done.

Continue reading "IR: Gillard fails on process, Keneally on policy" »

Five years ago, Glen Viegas cut into a live wire as he worked on the construction of a shopping centre on the NSW Central Coast. That wire should have been disconnected. But it wasn’t. Glen was killed, and an hour and a half later, his wife Andreia had to pull back a white hospital sheet to identify her husband’s body.

Next time you see burly construction workers marching in a protest, consider stories like Andreia’s, and the fact that on average, one construction worker dies from work every week.

The experience of Andreia, and others like her, is what motivates trade unionists when we push for the best possible health and safety laws.

Continue reading "Unions turn on Gillard over worker safety" »