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738 industrial accidents recorded countrywide – Labour Minister
A total of 738 industrial accidents were recorded by the Ministry of Labour during the past year representing a noticeable increase in such incidents, according to Minister of Labour, Dr Nanda Gopaul.
Dr Gopaul said during a recent press briefing, that of the total accidents reported to the Ministry, 12 were fatalities.
The mining industry, the Minister said, attracted six accidents, four occurred in the shipping industry, while there was one each in the fishing industry and forestry sector.
Minister of Labour, Dr Nanda Gopaul
“Even the most minor of accidents under Occupational Health and Safety (regulations) must be reported to the Ministry so we can safely say that the figure we have is accurate,” said Dr Gopaul.
According to the Minister, all accidents are investigated and reports have since been submitted to the Ministry, even for the smallest infractions.
Speaking specifically to the fatal accidents, the Minister said that reports of such nature have also been submitted to the Ministry and they are currently being carefully scrutinised with a view to seeing whether prosecution is necessary.
Earlier this year emphasis was placed on Occupational Health and Safety by the Labour Ministry when it launched its Occupational Health and Safety month of activities. A ‘symposium and fair’ was held in April at the Umana Yana.
Dr Gopaul said during the press briefing that after a lapse of about four years the Ministry’s cooperation with its tripartite partners, that is Consultative Association of Guyanese Industry (CAGI) and the union movement, were able to introduce an Occupational Health and Safety Committee. The Committee is headed by Mr Seepaul Narine and has members from various agencies.
Again with the support of another Committee (the Tripartite Committee), the Ministry was able to launch a series of training programmes for this year and apart from labour officers, other staff members were exposed to weekly edification sessions. The training sessions were facilitated by local partners in the Tripartite Committee and was also complemented by a prosecution course with was conducted by the Office of the Director of Public Prosecution (DPP).
Included in this programme were National Insurance Scheme’s inspectors as well as Probation Officers. “This was the beginning of a strengthening of relationships between the prosecution department of the various bodies dealing with labour and other matters…that prosecution programme was conducted by the Office of the DPP but saw a collaborated effort on the part of NIS, our Labour Division and the probations officers,” Dr Gopaul said.
This move was essential since according to Dr Gopaul “if we work as a team we are likely to see greater success than if we operate as individual groupings. We can coordinate our visits and this is why we have coordinated the training programmes.”
The whole process was aided by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) through the person of Consultant Rozanne Richards who ably guided officers in writing the ILO Convention reports as is required.
“We did a programme on report writing while another ILO specialist conducted training for reporting and our obligations to the ILO…” Dr Gopaul informed.
This latter undertaking was done even as the ILO’s Mr Anthony Rutherford conducted yet another training programme on safety in the forestry and fisheries sector in November of this year.
“So we have placed heavy emphasis on Occupational Health and Safety during the course of the year,” said Dr Gopaul.
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