TUC launches new 'safety at work' campaign as activists face criminal charges

The TUC is joining with the Campaign for Corporate Accountability (CCA) to launch a new campaign to improve workplace safety, including new laws and more resources for the Health and Safety Executive and local authorities. The new campaign will, for the first time, bring trade unions, safety organisations and bereaved families (from both work-related deaths and disasters) into a coalition demanding government action on a core set of safety demands.

In the light of 2,286 workplace deaths over the last five years, the camapign is calling for reform of the law on corporate killing, legally binding safety duties for directors, and a general tightening of health and safety law, including more inspectors and possible custodial sentences for directors.

One of the supporters of the campaign is Anne Jones, mother of Simon Jones who was killed on his first day working on Shoreham docks in 1998. The boss of the company (Euromin) he was working for was acquitted of manslaughter last year.

In a blackly comic reversal of true responsibility, five supporters of the campaign for justice for Simon Jones' death have been in court recently on charges of 'besetting' - an offence under anti-trade-union law - following arrests during an occupation of Euromin's Shoreham dock on 3rd December. One of the accused, Carly North, from Brighton, friend of Simon's, said, "My friend died and the company that killed him gets off with a fine. I sit in their office for a couple of hours and get charged as if I'm the criminal. It was when I was getting fingerprinted and DNAed I thought, 'no, this isn't right'. I just wish the police and the powers that be would put more effort and resources into arresting managers who risk their employees lives without people having to organise protests to make them. I'm no legal expert, but it seems to me that that would make a lot more sense than charging people who are trying to prevent more deaths."

http://www.tuc.org.uk/h_and_s/tuc-4267-f0.cfm
http://www.simonjones.org.uk/latest.htm