Chemical Workers Have No Say On Their Own Safety
By Jordan Barab, Confined Space
In a 3-1 vote, the Chemical Safety Board voted Tuesday to withdraw recommendations calling for the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement to strengthen worker participation requirements and to take measures to prohibit retaliation against workers who use their rights. Chair Vanessa Sutherland, joined by members Manny Ehrlich and Kristen Kulinowski voted to rescind the recommendations despite a spirited defense by board member Rick Engler, who voted to keep the recommendations.
In April 2016, the board unanimously approved a 4-volume “Macondo Investigation Report” in response to the catastrophic Deepwater Horizon blowout that killed 11 workers, injured 17 and spilled 5 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. The report contained a number of recommendations, including four recommendations calling for the bureau to significantly strengthen its regulations requiring worker participation in the employer’s safety program, and enhanced whistleblower protections for workers participating in safety activities. Last month, however, the board’s recommendations staff recommended that these recommendations be withdrawn in the face of opposition from the bureau, which claimed that it has no jurisdiction to adopt the board recommendations.
The board’s discussion focused on whether the bureau has authority to forbid retaliation, or whether it would better be placed at OSHA (or the Coast Guard) and whether Congress would be more appropriate to effect change than the board. This was progress from the Oct. 16 meeting when the discussion revolved mostly around whether there was enough evidence in the report to justify the recommendations. Apparently, the board members satisfied themselves that there was actually enough evidence of causation.
https://www.dcreport.org/2017/11/16/chemical-workers-have-no-say-on-their-own-safety/
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