Unions, Employers Quarrel Over Safety Gear Tab (Bush administration has stalled )

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Unions, Employers Quarrel Over Safety Gear Tab: Cindy Skrzycki



By Cindy Skrzycki

Jan. 16 (Bloomberg) -- For almost eight years, labor unions have been waiting for the Labor Department to finish a rulemaking that would make it clear employers are supposed to pick up the tab for safety equipment for millions of workers.

Many companies already foot the bill for goggles, hard hats, ear plugs, mesh gloves, safety harnesses, and other gear that they have been required to ``provide'' since 1994. Some industry sectors, homebuilders, poultry processors and construction firms say the proposed mandate to pay is too open-ended.

Labor officials say the complicated nature of the issue, both legal and practical, has caused the delays. The unions claim the Bush administration has stalled because it is ``looking out for corporate interests.''

So on Jan. 3, the AFL-CIO and the United Food and Commercial Workers Union filed suit in the U.S. Court of Appeals in Washington, D.C. to force the government to complete the long- postponed proposal.

``This is an uncomplicated rulemaking on a straightforward, but significant, issue of importance to worker safety and health,'' the suit said. It asked that Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration be directed to complete the regulation within two months of a court order.

The ``personal protective equipment'' industry includes manufacturers such as 3M Co. and E.I. du Pont de Nemours and Co. It has sales of about $10 billion annually, according to the International Safety Equipment Association in Arlington, Virginia. The government estimates the rule would cost businesses about $62 million a year.

Long History

The controversy has a long history. When the initial protective equipment rule was issued in 1994, it said employers had to ``provide'' various safety gear. But unlike a series of health-related OSHA standards, it didn't say who should pay the bill, and not every company did.

Northrop Grumman Corp.'s Newport News Shipbuilding Inc. in Newport News, Virginia, for example, provides and pays for protective equipment for its 19,000 employees.

``We like consistency,'' said James Thornton, director of environmental health and safety for the shipyard, which builds and maintains aircraft carriers and submarines. ``We prefer that we purchase them, provide them and train employees on the equipment.''

The unions believe that lower-paid workers in industries like poultry processing do not get the same deal.

There is a great deal of debate by some companies over such issues as what items are considered ``tools of the trade'' and are expected to be owned and paid for by employees, how replacement equipment is covered, what labor agreements might stipulate, and whether the rule should cover temporary workers.

``It's the low-wage worker in forgotten industries'' who are most affected, said Jacqueline Nowell, director of the occupational, safety and health office for the food and commercial workers union.

FULL story at link.