Lo and AOF is organising a meeting on this day where we want to focus attention on the challenges for Norwegian workers and also look into the international picture. The program includes posts about work and health, work-related diseases and injuries, and work life/work environment crime seen from both the parties and the Labour Inspectorate. We will also look at the experiences with collocation of the various agencies in the fight against labour crime. Webpage
A message from United Support and Memorial for Workplace Fatalities (USMWF) – Facebook page
Dear friends,
For your information here are the ads in different languages considering the workers memorial day.
yours, Tiina
Tiina Nurmi-Kokko
sosiaalisihteeri – socialsekreterare – social secretary, VTS
Rakennusliitto ry – Byggnadsförbundet rf – Construction Trade Union tiina.nurmi-kokko@rakennusliitto.fi
Tel:+358 20 774 3082. Fax:+358 20 774 3062
Every year on 28 April, the trade unions stage an event to condemn deaths caused by work. This year, the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) has chosen to focus on the need to adopt new health and safety laws at EU level. “Workers need better protection. New laws are needed now,” said Esther Lynch, the ETUC Confederal Secretary in charge of occupational health and safety issues.
“The best way to protect workers from disease and injury is through laws at EU and national level. Health protection should not be deregulated or privatised. New technology and innovation have created, and medical research identified, new risks. Strong laws should be backed up by strong enforcement and a strong system of workplace health and safety representatives”, she added.
The ETUC calls more specifically for the European Union to adopt threshold limit values for occupational exposure to 50 carcinogenic substances. The European workers’ movement emphasises that every year 100,000 people die in the EU from cancers developed at work.
Besides dealing with occupational cancers, the ETUC also wants new regulations to be adopted to tackle workers’ exposure to nanoparticles, to psycho-social risks (including stress, violence and harassment) and to the development of musculoskeletal disorders such as neck, back and elbow pain.
To raise awareness, the ETUC will be organising an ‘online action’ from 18 to 28 April alongside trade union leaders who will be demanding new European health and safety regulations.
To find out more:
http://www.etui.org/News/World-Day-for-Safety-and-Health-at-Work-ETUC-calls-for-new-laws
Join Worksafe, Street Level Health Project, and Centro Legal de la Raza for an evening of action and remembrance.
4:30 PM — Lake Merritt Amphitheater
Meet and march downtown
5:30-6:30 PM — City Hall
Rally & Memorial program
This year’s Worker’s Memorial Dayevent, Reclaim Labor! Reclaim Lives!is dedicated to honoring all the day laborers, immigrants, and low wage workers whose lives have been lost due to unsafe working conditions. We will come together in mourning and solidarity, and highlight the importance of the continuing fight for workers’ rights.
4:30pm: Meet at the Lake Merritt Amphitheater (between 12th Street and 1st Ave. on Lake Merritt Blvd. in Downtown Oakland) and then march to City Hall (1 Frank H. Ogawa Plaza).
5:30pm: Short memorial program featuring workers, labor, government agencies, and advocates.
A moment of silence will be observed to mourn workers who passed in the workplace in the prior year.
News release English • Spanish • Website
Below is a message from Allt åt alla Göteborg. Further details are available on their Facebook event page and website
“Come and honor the workers who have been killed, injured and worn out by their jobs, on our commemoration of Workers Memorial Day. A day when we commemorate the comrades who would still be among us, if their work had been safe. No one should die because of their job, no one should get sick from work. For workplace democracy and against the capitalists’ love of profits – come to our rally on 28 April.
“Background
The construction workers who build the houses we live in, people should really be rewarded – get exploited in cold blood, die or become seriously injured. In other industries such as health care, many people work under unreasonable pressure, and suffer premature wear due to the workload. Over 51 958 work accidents in Sweden were reported in 2013, and 55 workers are killed on average at their job every year. Our managers believe that our work must be more efficient. We do not think so. Every person is who murdered or injured in the workplace, is a person too many.
“We shall fight against downsizing, streamlining, increased workload and reduced influence and for workplace democracy. In the end, it is we who work who know how the work should be managed. The answer is economic democracy. That is to say that we who work should decide over the work. Democracy must not stop when one enters the workplace, that is where it should be practiced. It is we who are working who are affected by decisions taken at the workplace, which is why should we have control.
“Burned out, spent, exhausted…
It is difficult for someone who is already burned out to respond to these injustices as passivity, anxiety, fear and depression are already a fact. This, together with the learned helplessness and individualism which bourgeois society schools us into can only be defeated by a united struggle with our colleagues. These “accidents” and deaths are in fact calculated risks that the employer is willing to take for increased profits and maintaining power. We refuse to accept this. Remember the dead – fight with the living!
“There are many things we can do in the fight for better conditions and greater influence. Start a working association with colleagues, publish a workplace newspaper, or start a Facebook page. Whether it takes place inside or outside a union: find out what applies and make your demands openly with the attitude that we workers are always right in workplace conflicts, as it is we who essentially are the workplace.
“No one should die, be injured or become ill because of their job
Democratize our workplaces Increase penalties for – and – the managers responsible for the deaths and illnesses in the workplace
For workers’ power and solidarity.”
Spanish national centers CCOO and UGT have started to visibilise their mobilisaton around 28th April with a round of meetings with political parties, expressing them the need to improve laws, enforcement and strengthening unions in order to secure occupational health and safety.
Actions are expected across Spain, with regions like Extremadura already planning a rally commemorating the 462 workers who have died since the adoption of the Spanish prevention law, highlighting the need to secure compliance and improvements to that framework.
You can read the joint CCOO-UGT Manifesto here
Another ITUC affiliate, USO will organise events under the slogan “No reps, no safety”, highlighting the importance of safety reps and the need for workers’ participation in order to ensure healthy working conditions.
For more information on CCOO and UGT activities for this 28th April, please contact Mr Francisco Javier Torres Fernandez, jtorres@ccoo.es and Emilio Gonzalez Vicente eigonzalez@cec.ugt.org
For USO activities, please contact Sara Garcia, s.saludlaboral@uso.es
This April 28th, the National Trade Union Confederation of Moldova (CNSM) will be organising a series of events, including gathering with over 400 trade union representatives, State labour inspectors, social partners and representatives of dead and injured workers’ families, a memorial service and media reports. The union will also provide solidarity support for the victims’ families. More information will be released in the union’s website
The New Zealand Congress of Trade Unions (CTU) has announced the organisation of memorial services, rallies and other actions in all the key cities of the country.
Details of the events can be found here
Put your #ToolsDown for International Workers’ Memorial Day next week.
The kit gives you everything you need to organise a place, talk to your boss and ideas on how to get your message across.
#IWMD16 is an opportunity to remember the dead, fight for the living and talk to your coworkers about how to improve health & safety.
Download the kit or ask for one to be mailed to you!
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