1. WHAT
IS THE ROLE OF EMPLOYEES?
OSHA
The Act requires each employee to comply with occupational safety and health
standards, as well as all rules, regulations, and orders issued under the Act that apply
to his or her own actions and conduct.
Employee Rights
Here’s a checklist. As employee, you should:
- read the OSHA poster at your jobsite;
- comply with any applicable OSHA standards;
- follow all of your employer's safety and
health standards and rules;
- wear or use prescribed protective
equipment;
- report hazardous conditions to your
supervisor;
- report any job-related injuries or
illnesses to your employer and seek treatment promptly;
- cooperate with the OSHA compliance officer
conducting an inspection if he inquires about conditions at your jobsite;
- use your rights under the Act responsibly.
Employee Rights
The Act provides that employees have certain rights. Here's a checklist. As an
employee, you may:
- obtain a copy of the OSHA standards and
other rules, regulations, and requirements from your employer, the nearest OSHA office, or
the Government Printing Office;
- request information from your employer on
safety and health hazards in your work area, on precautions you need to take, and on what
you must do if you're involved in an accident or exposed to toxic substances;
- accompany the OSHA compliance officer
during the inspection walkaround if you are designated by your union or employee
association;
- observe monitoring or measuring of
hazardous materials, including the right of access to records on those materials, as
specified in regulations under the Act;
- submit a written request to the National
Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) for information on whether any
substance in your workplace has potentially toxic effects in the concentration being used,
and have your name with held from your employer if you so desire;
- request the OSHA area director, in
writing, to conduct an inspection if you believe a hazardous condition exists in your
workplace. You must be specific and name the hazard that concerns you (You should,
however, first make a good-faith effort to have your employer correct the condition);
- have your name withheld from your
employer, upon your request to OSHA, if you file a complaint;
- be advised of OSHA actions regarding your
complaint and have an informal review, if you request it, of any decision not to make an
inspection;
- file a complaint to OSHA within 30 days if
you believe you have been discriminated against because you asserted a right under the Act
and be notified by OSHA of its decision within 90 days of your filing;
- object to the abatement period fixed in
the citation issued to your employer by appealing to the Occupational Safety and Health
Review Commission (it is not possible to do this without having your name revealed since
the area director must send your objection to the Review Commission);
- be notified by your employer if he applies
for a variance (waiver) from an OSHA standard, testify at a variance hearing, and appeal
the final decision; s
- ubmit information or comment to OSHA on
the issuance, modification, or revocation of OSHA standards, and request a public hearing.
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2. TOP
25 CONSTRUCTION STANDARDS CITED (OCTOBER 1, 1986 TO SEPTEMBER 30, 1987)
1. 1926.50(f) Emergency phone numbers
not posted.
2. 1926.404(1) (6) No effective grounding
- ground wire not continuous.
3. 1926.404(b) (1) No GFCI or Assured
Equipment Grounding Program.
4. 1926.150(c) (1) (i) No fire protection
for the work area.
5. 1926.50(d) (1) No first aid supplies.
6, 1926.152 (a)(1) No safety cans for flammable
liquids.
7. 1926.602(a) (9) (i) No horn for
operator on bi-directional machine.
8. 1926.150(e) (2) Fire alarm codes
not posted at phone and entrance.
9. 1926.625(a) Housekeeping.
10. 1926.416(e) (1) Worn or frayed
electric cords or cables.
11. 19266.28(a) Require employees
to wear personal protective equipment.
12. 1926.l00(a) Employees not
protected with hard hats.
13. 1926.405(g) (2) (iv) Plugs on cords
without effective cord grips.
14. 1926.150(c) (1) (iv) Inadequate fire
extinguishers in multi-storybuilding.
15. 1926.450(a) (10) Ladders not
tied off or blocked to preventdisplacement.
16. 1926.150(e) (1) No fire alarm system
to alert employees and fire department.
17. 1926.500(e) (1) (iii) No stair
railings - less 44" - open both sides.
18. 1926.450(a) (2) Broken
ladders in use.
19. 1926.403(h) Disconnects not marked as
to purpose.
20. 1926.500(e) (1) (iv) No stair rails -
44" to 88" - open on one side.
21. 1926.350(a) (9) Gas cylinders not
secured.
22. 1926.152(g) (9) "No smoking
signs not posted.
23. 1926.1904.5 Annual summary not posted
in February.
24. 1926.350(j) Oxygen cylinders not
separated from fuel.
25. 1926.450(a) (1) Ladders not provided
for safe access.
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3. SUPERVISOR
IS KEY TO OSHA SUCCESS
If I were asked to put my finger on the one thing that can do more than any other to
improve safety in every industry, I would not pull out a copy of OSHA's standards. I would
not speak of first instance sanctions, or federal vs. state plans. I would point directly
at you - the first-line supervisor. You are the guys who know the jobs. You are the guys
who know the hazards - because you have worked around them and, because you're
here, gives proof that you survived them. You are the men whom the workers listen
to and look to for direction.
OSHA's inspectors may
visit a plant once in a lifetime. The safety committee or the safety engineer may come
around once a month or so. But you are on the job every day all through a working shift
period. You can see hazards developing. You can see a worker sliding into careless habits.
You can spot the faulty equipment, the dangerous situation, as soon as it begins.
And you correct it. You
can force the change in the workman's habits; you car see to it that the dangerous tool is
repaired or retired.
Yet are you doing these
things?
It may mean "chewing out" a
personal friend, or hassling with your own boss. But you may be richly rewarded. You may
have saved a life or a limb. If I seem to be saying that each of you should be a safety
expert, then you are hearing me dead right. Each of you, when you think about it, must be
a safety expert - you should know the dangers of your workplace.
All the laws, all the
studies, all the books, however important they may be, can never take the place of your
common sense. And no one is in a better position to use that common sense.
Let me pose a question.
If a lathe or an earth- mover or a press were ruined because you didn't insist that the
machine be properly oiled, what would happen to you? You know the answer; You'd probably
be fired or demoted.
Let me pose a second question. When was
the last time you heard of a foreman being fired because one of his crew had been
injured in an accident? The answer, of course, is practically never. Yet loss of a man is
always worse than loss of a machine. And your men must be a much greater responsibility
than your machines. That time has come Industry must realize this and act upon it, now
We hear a good deal about the importance
of top management taking an interest in safety. And it is important - damned important.
But no front office can do the job the way the foreman can do it.
I believe we are fast
moving toward the day when, to hold his job, a foreman will first have to hold a
certificate proving his knowledge of safe practices, standards, and detection of hazards.
This requirement may first be seen in the longshoring industry. Other industries will
follow.
There's nothing really
new in what I'm saying. Fifty years ago, the Associated General Contractors put out its
first safety manual. It said: "No hard and fast rules will insure safety on a job.
This can be secured only by constant and careful attention on the part of the
superintendent and foreman, with the cooperation of the workmen." The manual goes on:
"Accidents do not happen in convention, or in the contractor's office. Accidents
happen on the job."
And that's where you men
are. And because you are there, on the job, where the accidents happen, I urge you to
remember your importance in making the job safe, and in keeping it safe. And I urge you to
take the same message to your fellow supervisors.
Because of your
special knowledge, you hold in your hands the effectiveness and productivity of your
co-worker. And often you hold his safety - his very life.
It is a big
responsibility; one that must be met unequivocally by people like you all across the
country. Only then can we reach our highest aim: the safest possible working conditions
for each man and woman in America.
If all of us, working
together, can achieve that, we will automatically achieve a lot of other things as well -
higher morale - greater productivity -which should mean higher returns to each man for his
labor.
But each of us will also
achieve, for himself as an individual, the greatest satisfaction I know of, the knowledge
that he has lived well and benefited his fellow human beings.
Sometimes, just before I go to sleep, I
can look back over what I've done that day and feel pretty good. r can feel that maybe
I've saved a man's arm, or a finger, or an eye, maybe a life.
If this kind of satisfaction can come to
me, many miles distant from the workplace, how much more rewarding it must be for you to
know, quietly, at the end of a day, that you have done the same.
Not for a statistic, or a percentage, or
a fraction of some tally of workmen; but for Joe, or Bill or Gus the men who work with
you.
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