– says some business houses ‘couldn’t care less’’
“An almost complete disregard for safety and health considerations,” obtains at several public and private sector entities and this could eventually seriously compromise Guyana’s standing as a destination for inves-tors, one of the country’s most experienced safety and health practitioners told the Stabroek Business in an exclusive interview last week.
“Now that there is an urban construction boom underway in Georgetown we are seeing more and more evidence of a lack of regard for the welfare of construction workers who are engaged on some of the sites and a failure on the part of the authorities to enforce the provisions of the Occupational Safety and Health Act,” Director of the recently established Optimum Safety Solu-tions (OSS) Dale Beresford said.
Earlier this week, Stabroek Business agreed to accompany the former chairman of the National Advisory Council on Occupational Safety and Health (NACOSH) to several locations across the city to observe several “long-standing safety and health transgressions”.
During the tour, this newspaper encountered instances of workers on construction sites without even the most basic of personal protective equipment (PPE). There was an absence of safety signs, standard dust and protective barrier equipment, safety harness and fall arrest kits and nets. Builders’ waste and construction material encumbered parts of roadways and sidewalks with pedestrians being forced to use the streets on account of the encumbrances.
Beresford also drew attention to food vendors whose safety and health documentation was not displayed as is required under the law. This newspaper encountered three vendors who were prepared to say that they had no such documentation.
Additionally, Stabroek Business also accompanied Beresford to two state-run premises where employees were housed in hot dusty buildings and where their only ‘comfort’ was fans circulating hot air.
At some snackettes and cafeterias across the city, Beresford pointed to instances in which there was an absence of running water and in some instances an absence of bathroom facilities. In the case of one of the city’s more prominent business houses the bathroom facilities were found to be in a deplorable state.
“What we are seeing here are signs of apathy and indifference. People don’t care about the law, they don’t bother to adhere to the law because they have no regard for the power of enforcement. We are yet to reach a stage where the authorities begin to go after the transgressors aggressively. Much of the blame has to be placed at the feet of the people who enforce the law,” Beresford added.
And according to Beresford, the problem of safety and health transgressions “has everything to do with the fact that these considerations are not taken seriously. We have had cases in which potential investors have actually raised the issue of safety and health and when we tell them that we have legislation they immediately ask about implementation.”
Beresford told Stabroek Business that there is more than sufficient evidence to indicate that large numbers of business persons “couldn’t care less” about the safety or the health of their employees. “There are cases in which workers must work in poorly ventilated buildings all day which, in some cases are packed with flammable material including fabric. That, coupled with the fact that there are “serious potential safety hazards” with electrical wiring in some downtown business places, means that there are cases in which lives are constantly at risk. What is interesting is that many of these transgressions have been occurring for several years.”
According to Beresford, Guyana’s rating as a favoured location for foreign investment is bound to be compromised unless the authorities move to ensure that the provisions of the country’s Occupational Health and Safety Act are respected. “One of the things that have always concerned me is the serious disincentive for service providers in the food industry arising out of the state of the city. We have had a few fast food franchises coming to Guyana over the years, but one has to ask oneself the question as to whether the state of the city and the conditions in which they are required to operate might not discourage more such franchises from coming here.”
Asked to give his views on the protracted failure to rid the city of what has now become a serious garbage problem, Beresford said he believed the problem amounted to “a matter of will”. The safety and health consultant told Stabroek Business that “providing that it matters that much to them” there is more than ample scope for the municipality and the government to work together to have a cleaner city. “Sometimes when you listen to the arguments you realize that they are about much more than the state of the city. Unfortunately, issues of safety and health and garbage and sanitation become subsumed beneath the politics.”
