Migrants short-shifted on OSH

Thailand News - Perspective - Sunday December 09, 2007

Migrants short-shifted on OSH

In theory, migrant workers are granted the same occupational safety and health (OSH) protections as their Thai counterparts, but in practice they are rarely implemented, writes ERIKA FRY

When Making Migrant Safety at Work Matter (MMSAWM) foundation volunteers first ask migrant workers if they feel safe at work, they almost always say "yes".

Then they ask the workers if they've ever known anyone who was injured - or maybe even died - at work, and they say, "yes". And then they ask the workers if they've ever been in accident at work themselves, and they say, "yes".

Chances are (based on 40 in-depth interviews of agricultural and construction workers in the Chiang Mai area) they've stepped on nails, contracted chronic skin rashes from wet cement, or suffer wooziness (and who-knows-what-other long-term effects) with daily application of pesticides in orange orchards.

Plenty of others have been crushed by falling beams, burned by electric flower pots, or bruised (in addition to the irritations) by more wet cement. And then (just to drive this point home), the foundation has the workers complete a 'bodymapping' exercise where, on a life-size rendering of themselves, they place a colourful post-it note on any area where they feel pain or have been injured, while working. (See the attached picture).

By the end of the exercise, the drawings have invariably become colourful, post-it covered beings and illustrations of the rarely-contemplated truth of migrant occupational safety and health (OSH).

That truth, says MMSAWM project coordinator Andy Hall, is that in Thailand OSH doesn't exist for migrants. While the "government has no systematic approach to address the matter" (some might argue that the situation is hardly better for the general population - a national OSH institute, after decades in the works, still does not exist) and employers tend to ignore the issue, he says the problem is exacerbated by the fact that safety is something that migrant workers themselves don't think much about. This is because they are so consumed with the issues of harassment, exploitation and avoiding deportation.

Rarely do they realise that they are entitled to various protections - including on-the-job-training and employer-provided personal protective equipment - in Thai-ratified ILO treaties and Thai labour law.

Unfortunately these protections are rarely realities at Thai worksites, particularly those of migrants.

Consider Zaw Tsun, a construction worker from Burma, who works on five-storey townhouse complexes at a site on the outskirts of Bangkok. He spends most days in the air, balanced on bamboo scaffolding, "afraid for every moment of it."

He has seen friends fall and has nearly slipped himself - there are no safety belts used at his site. He was never told what to do or how to protect himself. He considers jeans and boots to be protective gear, and "being extra careful" is his personal safety plan.

When there are accidents, he says his employer is absent and workers take the blame. "It's like 'this thing is your fault.' You're supposed to be careful and you should know that."

At the same time, he doesn't question the conditions. "Construction work is dangerous," he says. "Because of the hardship of living, I force myself to work. I have no choice."

He and his family came to Thailand with hopes for better economic opportunities, but also because they were driven from their town by the Burmese military.

Sai Learn, a Shan fworker in Chiang Mai, suffered injuries when an iron bar fell on his head. He couldn't work for four months and still struggles with a stabbing pain.

When asked about his employer's reaction to the accident, he said, "He showed little interest. I also did not want to complain about it because it is my own luck to blame."

Because of this type of attitude, MMSAWM volunteers have been doing what they can to improve the awareness of migrants about dangers at work and how to protect themselves.

The organisation has produced safety materials in the Shan and Burmese languages for agricultural and construction workers, to be distributed to workers in Chiang Mai, Mae Sot, and Samut Sakorn at outreach sessions where educational activities such as interviews and bodymapping are conducted.

Hall says the efforts can be frustrating , though, as the resources and technical expertise required for occupational safety training and education can be hard to come by.

Labour laws apply

While there may not be a separate migrant occupational safety programme, Vinai Lutthigaviboon, the director of the Department of Labour Protection and Welfare's (DLPW) Occupational Safety and Health Inspection Division, explains that "labour law prescribes our department is responsible for looking after workers, regardless of their nationality," and so migrant workers are protected by the same laws and safety programmes that cover Thai workers.

He is also clear that detailed law exists to ensure worksites are safe. Within the construction industry, for example, there are regulations that stipulate safe and proper conditions for cranes, piling, and "bouncing objects".

The problem is of course, enforcement of these stipulations, which is hard for the department with a staff of 300 inspectors - each capable of visiting 1 or 2 sites a day - for a nation of 400,000 worksites and 30 million workers.

Because of this shortage, the department prioritises its visits to small and medium-sized enterprises, and in a 3-month campaign initiated in October to small and medium-construction sites. This is in response to a growing awareness of problems in the construction industry, the most unsafe industry according to the department's statistics.

Vinai says 70% of the workplaces they visit warrant an "order for improvement", which means the company will be given a month to better conditions before being subjected to a follow-up inspection. Worksites that have eggregious, especially dangerous safety violations (a malfunctioning crane, for example) will be shut down immediately until conditions are improved.

In addition to performing random site inspections, the department is also responsible for investigating serious on-the-job accidents and deaths, which when reported should also automatically result in fines or imprisonment of the employer.

In addition to their manpower shortage, Vinai says some industries like the construction business are particularly challenging in terms of safety because the nature of the work is inevitably dangerous.

"Construction accidents happen at a very high rate compared to other industries," he says, partly because employers "just want to complete the work as quickly as possible. The longer it takes, the more costly it is for them."

Meanwhile, workers in agricultural, fishing, and domestic sectors are not protected by the Department at all.

He adds that employers are not always familiar with OSH, and for budget reasons are often unwilling or incapable of providing training. "Workers have low education, lack training and usually don't realise risks - this is especially true for migrant workers."

The department holds seminars for small company owners on the subject twice a year and is drafting a law that would require every employer to establish a safety mangement system for their workplace (creating a safety recording system and analysing workplace hazards, for example).

Even so, while the department recognises this need and encourages employers to comply with the law and provide job and training and safety materials, it makes no special provisions for migrant workers, who may not speak or understand Thai.

Vinai explains that migrant workers usually only come to a workplace where they already know another worker. Those workers who have been in the country for a while are likely to speak Thai and can inform those who cannot, he says.

Such reasoning seems an unfair and dangerous expectation for migrant workers, particularly since even the very few that do speak Thai rarely seem to receive training.

"Young workers that may not be trained are especially prone to accidents," says Dr Tsuyoshi Kawakami, the ILO's regional specialist on OSH. He adds that clear national policy on the growing issue of migrant labour safety is important everywhere, and beneficial to everyone.

While workers become safer with training, they also become more productive for their employers, he says. "Accidents are not good for anyone."

While Hall theoretically agrees, he adds a condition, that it "depends on whether employer sees worker as a human or as a commodity". Too often, he sees cases where it is the latter.

For that reason, he hopes the work of MMSAWM can instill "a culture" that will empower migrants to pursue better workplace conditions themselves.

"The calls for safety must start from the migrants themselves, but right now, they have no knowledge nor forum to complain," he says.

Nang Noom, the Shan woman and construction worker who was paralysed in an on-the-job accident at the Shangri-la Hotel site in Chiang Mai last December and who Perspective reported on this October, has finally gotten a break.

Eleven months after the incident, Nang Noom (pictured here in hospital) received a lump sum payment from her employer, a sub-contractor of the Shangri-la Hotel group to compensate her for her injury.

The payment ended (but did not settle) Nang Noom's months-long battle to receive compensation from the Social Security Office's Workmen's Compensation Fund (WCF), as a migrant worker.

Contrary to its commitments in Thai labour law and Thai-ratified ILO treaties, SSO had denied Nang Noom access to the fund on the grounds of her being a worker from Burma, who had, before becoming a registered worker, illegally entered Thailand.

The WCF Appeals Committee was in its third month of considering the case when her employer agreed to the payment. The Appeals Committee has still not announced its decision, and likely never will.

While Nang Noom's employer came through - after a long battle and much bad press - the SSO has slid by, dodging its obligations to workers of all nationalities and setting back the effort to give 2 million migrant workers in the country their basic rights.

It is future migrant occupational accident victims that will undoubtedly suffer. Various unions and human rights groups are filing complaints with the ILO, and plan to petition the Administrative Court of Thailand, should the SSO not reverse its discriminatory WCF policy.

Bangkok Post