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29/08/2008
Labor and Social Security Minister Faruk Çelik is set to present a new bill to Parliament in October that aims to improve occupational health and safety for Turkish workers.
The "Occupational Health and Safety" bill pertains to the government’s Third National Program released last week in the context of Turkey’s European Union harmonization process as part of the nation’s EU bid.
Even though EU directive 89/2 required the Turkish government to meet EU criteria regarding occupational health and safety in 2005, the ministry accelerated its work on the bill only following recent deaths at Tuzla, a small district in İstanbul hosting 46 shipyards that is infamous for frequent and fatal work-related accidents.
The new bill anticipates a significant change in existing laws, removing the disparities between requirements for private and public workplaces. If an employer maintains even one employee, they will be required to instate all workplace occupational safety precautions on the books. Currently, only the employers with 50 employees or more are required to comply with occupational safety regulations.
If the bill passes, employers will have to conduct risk analyses at workplaces in terms of employee health and safety. Employers who do not comply with the new requirements will be fined heavily or their businesses shut down.
The Labor and Social Security Ministry began working on the bill at the beginning of 2006 and presented a draft in June last year to unions and civil society groups.
However workers’ unions have not been receptive to the anticipated changes. They say that because employers will have to increase expenditures while taking measures to provide more occupational health and safety, this will lead to employee layoffs.
After hearing criticism of the draft, the ministry prepared a new bill and plans to bring it before the legislature when Parliament resumes on Oct. 1.
According to the bill, if there is more than one employee at a workplace there must be a representative to coordinate occupational health and safety issues. Employers will be required to document all work-related accidents and illnesses and present a report to the ministry within three days of the occurrence of such events. The report must include not just accidents that occurred but also near-accidents that were prevented but almost resulted in injury, in order to enable the ministry to determine necessary safety measures to be taken by the employer.
If employers take in employees from other workplaces, this would be documented and if requested would be presented to the ministry. And an employee elected by employees will serve as a representative on occupational health and safety issues. When it comes to the requirement that workplaces employing more than 50 workers employ a physician, the new bill anticipates that health offices be formed by employers in the same sector.
Source: Today’s Zaman
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