4 May 2007
Honourable guests, ladies and gentlemen
Programme director, your worship, Mayor of Rustenburg
Director of ILO
International dignitaries
Representatives of organised labour
Representatives of organised business
Representatives of the media
Director General of Labour
Distinguished guests
Ladies and gentlemen
Today, we are gathered to celebrate the World Day for Safety and Health at
Work. This is not only the time to collaborate but also to remember and honour
those who continue to face challenges of health and safety at workplaces. We
are mindful that many of them will not return home and that those that will
return will be maimed or categorised as terminally ill. Some will be lucky or
in a fortunate position to walk away with their lives. There are those
employers who will continue to "discard" these unfortunate workers without
conscience and without any consideration for their moral obligations.
We salute those workers who have had to pay with their lives and we remember
those families who today, will not have the pleasure of a mother or father at
home as a result of unsafe and unhealthy workplaces. The International Labour
Organisation (ILO) theme for 2007 World Health and Safety Day is "Safe and
Healthy workplaces - making decent work a reality".
For South Africa, this year signifies the celebration of five years of
rising successes marked by what the Department of Labour, together with its
social partners, have achieved:
1. Signing of the Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) Accord in 2002 saw
labour, business and government coming together with the realisation that no
"one" entity would succeed in fighting this fight without the other. Each
constituency committed itself to working with others to attain a common
goalâhealth and safe workplaces.
2. The Programme for the elimination of silicosis by the year 2030 was
launched in 2004. South Africa and a number of other countries around the world
have joined the ILO to face an on-going challenge in eliminating silicosis at
the workplace. In order to deal with this issue effectively, South Africa
launched the programme for the elimination of silicosis and to that end we must
ensure that we reach the commitment of reducing the prevalence of silicosis by
2015 and elimination of silicosis at workplaces by 2030 or earlier.
3. National and provincial occupational health and safety fora have been
running for the last couple of years and were developed to provide labour and
business with a platform to deal with common issues that needed to be
addressed.
4. An OHS Conference hosted in October in Boksburg last year saw over 500
delegates in attendance. The sole purpose of the conference was to allow
stakeholders to contribute to the on-going programmes currently underway in my
Department. Some of the resolutions of that conference included:
* the establishment of industrial forums
* training of inspectors and workers.
5 High risk sector incident reduction programme has been a key element in
the reduction of incidents over the last year.
The challenge though that my Department is faced with is under-reporting of
incidents. This not only has an impact on the statistics kept by the department
but that we are not in a position to assist employers to prevent similar
incidents from taking place at that particular workplace again. Monitoring of
the impact of the legislation also becomes difficult. I therefore wish to
remind all of us here of our on-going commitment to ensuring compliance with
legislation by reporting incidents in line with prescribed legislation.
6. Increased use of blitzes on specific sectors. This year we will continue
our focus on the construction sector as we did in 2004. My department also
blitzed two other problematic sectors that are also showing signs of not
dealing effectively with incidents at their workplaces. We will continue our
focus on this and other sectors until we make that much needed break through. I
have indicated in the past that one death at any workplace is one death too
many.
As we are all aware, at this moment in time our country is undergoing a
tremendous boom in the construction sector with the coming of the Gautrain and
the 2010 Soccer World Cup. Dams are being built in certain parts of our country
in order to address our natural resources and its scarcity. There are also
tremendous growth areas currently underway in different parts of our country.
With this pressure being placed on our resources, there is little or no room
for error as the margins are tight. Workers will be required to work overtime
when things do not go according to schedule and this naturally comes with its
own set of challenges.
Globally construction seem to be a growing sector but also a problematic
sector in terms of health and safety and as community in South Africa, we need
to make a difference in this sector to promote health and safety. Decent work
is safe work and it involves:
* opportunities for work that is productive and delivers a fair income
* security in the workplace and social protection
* better prospects for personal development and social integration
* freedom for people to express their concerns, organise and participate in the
decisions that affect their lives
* equality for opportunity and treatment for all women and men.
Ladies and gentlemen, the ILO estimates that over two million workers die
each year from work-related accidents and diseases and globally this figure
appears to be on the increase. In 2005, R168 million was paid for claims
received from construction sector only. In 2006, R201 million was paid for
claims received from the construction sector. This represents 9,4 percent of
all claims paid out by the Compensation Commissioner. During the 2005/06
financial year the total number of fatal incidents were reduced by 3,8 percent.
Unfortunately though, the incident rate in the construction sector for 11
months of last year stood at over 130 fatalities. It is evident then that the
economic cost is high without referring to the social impact. This money could
be used to improve the infrastructure and other social issues in this country
of ours.
My Department has already considered its options going forward in the light
of the boom in the construction sector and how to deal effectively with the
challenges that this sector poses. Should the current economic growth continue
in this sector then we could see a spiral upwards in incidents unless we as a
collective arrest it. We have begun a process of ensuring that our inspectors
are ready to meet the future needs in an ongoing programme and to that end we
have trained about 60 inspectors in construction recently. This programme will
continue into the future as we seek to provide those of you in the construction
sector with the appropriate services that you require.
Ladies and gentlemen, the South African government has ratified all ILO
conventions related to principles and rights at work committing ourselves to
upholding the basic human values-that are vital to our social and economic
freedom, viz. freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining
etc. We are bound by the ILO constitution to promote and realise in good faith
the principles concerning fundamental rights. ILO member states adopted a
global Occupational Safety and Health strategy in 2003, "to promote a
preventative approach to reduce work related accidents and diseases".
ILO instruments such as guidelines play a vital role in the promotion of
occupational health and safety at work. While the Department of Labour has
committed itself to using these invaluable documents in order to promote
occupational health and safety my staff are also in the process of developing
guidelines that speak to our local conditions and has already developed its own
guidelines for the construction sector amongst others. The inspection
enforcement service strategy of the Department of Labour is being reviewed to
allow us to deliver appropriate services to our clients and to ensure a higher
level of compliance is achieved.
My inspectors will also take on an additional role over the next couple of
years to ensure that we as a collective join forces in tackling the challenge
that we have in dealing with the scourge that continues to ravage our country
and to this end they will be trained on HIV/AIDS at the workplace in order to
assist employers and labour.
In conclusion, we continue to look to you for that much needed support and
will look forward to working with you and listening to you as the workers and
employers of this beautiful country of ours. I urge all workers, employers, to
actively participate in securing a safe and healthy working environment through
a system of defined rights, responsibilities and duties where the principle of
prevention is accorded the highest priority by treating the symptoms first.
I thank you.
Issued by: Department of Labour
4 May 2007
