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• Index • Regional Summary • Bulgaria • Czech Republic • Estonia • Index • Part 1 • Part 2 • Part 3 • Part 4 • Part 5 • Part 6 • Part 7 • Part 8 • Summary • Lists • Hungary • Lithuania • Russia • Slovakia • Ukraine • Data |
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Part VIII: Structures with dealing with occupational and environmental health
1. Introduction
| Figure 20. Respondents that were aware of national regulations concerning occupational health and safety |
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The survey tried to get an idea of the extent to which various structures existed in Estonia for dealing with occupational and environmental health. Safety at the workplace should reflect regulatory requirements and enforcement and additional voluntary guidelines, programmes and policies, record-keeping, collective bargaining, osh committees, and workers' participation in general.
2. Health and safety regulations
The respondents' awareness of the existence of national health and safety regulations and environmental regulations was better than their awareness of regulations on workplace exposure levels (See figure 20).
It was estimated that health and safety regulations were put into practice in 55.7% of the workplaces surveyed, but in 26.9% it was stated categorically that OSH regulations were not put into practice. In the service sector, regulations were put in practice in only 25% of the workplaces.
63% of respondents stated that penalties were imposed for violations of regulations. Again, the percentage was much lower in the service industries, where penalties were imposed in only 38% of the workplaces.
44.4% of the respondents said that their union participated in the development of the regulations, compared with 38.9% who said that their union did not. Only 23.6% of the respondents were aware of ILO Conventions on occupational health and safety.
| Figure 21. Workplaces where the management had certain policies related to occupational health and safety |
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3. Programmes and policies
69.8% of the workplaces surveyed had a health and safety training programme for workers, and 66.7% had a health and safety policy (See figure 21).
Of those workplaces which had a management policy to reduce dangerous substances, only 86.7% also had a health and safety policy and 87.5% also had a health and safety training programme. Conversely, only 40.6% of the workplaces with a health and safety policy also had a policy to reduce dangerous substances.
Environmental management often requires a complete programme of its own although some companies address environmental issues along with occupational safety and health as part of a comprehensive programme. Today's health and safety issues, particularly in polluting industries, must address risks beyond the workplace walls. Contingency plans are part of planning for disasters, contractors' activities, product liability exposures, etc. More aggressive environmental management incorporates pollution prevention and an active role in environmental improvement. However, only 46.2% of respondents stated that their management had an environmental policy at their workplace.
62.3% of workplaces surveyed had a management policy on alcohol testing, of which 68.8% actually carry out the testing of workers for alcohol Likewise, 28.8% of workplaces had a policy on drug abuse, of which 21.4% actually carried out the testing of workers for illegal drugs.
| Figure 22. Workplaces where the management keeps records on occupational injuries, illnesses and workplace exposures |
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4. Records kept by the management
Records of injuries and illnesses and incident investigations can produce a large quantity of data. Record keeping is important for individual worker case histories of exposures and effects, in which case it is recommended that records are kept for future evidence of potential disease, often for many years after exposure or after leaving a company. Records of incidents can also be analysed to provide early warning of more serious safety and health problems. Accident and health records can be used to identify hazards, measure safety performance and improvement, and help identify patterns.
According to 89.1% of the respondents, management keeps records on occupational injuries, 58.2% on occupational illnesses, and 53.7% on workplace exposure levels (See figure 22).
As discussed earlier, 56.4% said that health records (as opposed to records on occupational illnesses) are kept by the company. This seeming discrepancy with the 58.2% of companies that keep records on occupational illnesses may be due simply to definitions, whereby occupational illness relates only to illnesses contracted as a result of work activities, and health records refer to the general state of health of the worker at the time of the medical visit.
| Figure 23. Workplaces by the number of years the occupational health and safety records are kept by the management |
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Only 42.9% of respondents could put some figure to the amount of time that records were kept. Of these, the length of time ranged from one to at least 25 years. In most of these workplaces, records were kept at least for 25 years (See figure 23).
5. Collective agreements
In 71.2% of the workplaces in the survey, health and safety was addressed in a collective agreement. In 17.3% it was not addressed in a collective agreement and in 11.5% the respondent did not know. Those workplaces where health and safety was not addressed in the collective agreement belonged to agriculture, hunting, forestry and fishing, wood products and furniture, construction, energy, electricity, gas and water and the health industries.
In almost all workplaces where it was addressed, the collective agreement was a local level agreement (See figure 24).
Environmental issues were included in the collective agreement in only 14% of the workplaces surveyed.
Concerning the question on the coverage of the collective agreement, many respondents said that it covers all workers and also that it covers only trade union members. As trade union membership was not 100% in these cases there is some discrepancy here and the results should be treated with caution.
| Figure 24. Workplaces with different levels of collective agreements addressing health and safety |
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6. Health and safety committees
One of the most effective structures for active participation of workers and their trade unions in promoting health and safety at the workplace is through the workplace health and safety committee.
In the Estonian sample, 59.3% of the workplaces had a joint union and management health and safety committee, and 11.3% had a union health and safety committee. All workplaces that had a union health and safety committee, also had a joint union and management health and safety committee.
Union members of the joint committee were elected by the trade union assembly in 82.8% of the workplaces and nominated by the trade union bodies in 23.1% of the workplaces. In 6%, the members were both elected and nominated.
83.3% of the respondents said that these joint committees were mandated by law, and 16.7% said they did not know if this was the case or not.
| Figure 25. Workplaces by the number of times the joint union/management health committee meets a year |
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Concerning the frequency of joint committee meetings, it must be pointed out that 33.3% of the respondents who were employed by workplaces where there was a joint management-union committee said they did not know how many times a year the committee meets. In addition, some of them did not answer at all to this question. Taking into account the positive responses, the committee met four times a year (See figure 25).
40% of the respondents said that the health and safety committee at their workplace was effective, although 30% could not say if it was or not.
58.1% of the health and safety committees had women representatives among their members. In the Estonian sample, there were two workplaces where all employees were women. One of these two had a health and safety committee, but the respondent did not know if there were women representatives in the committee. Otherwise, the proportion of women employees was clearly related to the existence of women representatives in the health and safety committees. In all workplaces, where there was a health and safety committee and where the percentage of women employees was at least 40% the health and safety committee had women representatives.
| Figure 26. Workplaces where worker representatives had certain rights related to occupational health and safety |
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7. Workers' participation rights
A company's real assets are its workers and they have a stake in ensuring they can work in a safe and healthful environment. Solutions to safety and health problems often come from affected employees and their trade unions. Research clearly demonstrates that trained health and safety representatives with the support of their trade unions are more likely to exercise their rights and thus contribute to a safe working environment. One of the most important factors in this is the right for representatives to receive training and to exercise their duties during working hours with no loss of pay.
It was therefore encouraging to see that worker representatives had the right to inspect the workplace for hazards in 81.8% of workplaces surveyed, to call in government inspectors in 80%, to receive health and safety training during working hours in 78.8%, to carry out their health and safety duties in working hours in 76.9%, to investigate accidents in 74.5%, and to stop dangerous work on behalf of workers in 72.2%. Only two rights - the right to give health and safety training during working hours and the right to participate in government inspections - were able to be exercised in less than 70% of workplaces (See figure 26).
| Figure 27. Workplaces where the union had the right to receive information, to consult the management and participate in decision making concerning OHS matters and environmental matters |
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In 84.6% of the workplaces, workers (as opposed to worker representatives) had the right to refuse dangerous work.
Trade union's rights to receive information from the management and consult with management were more common than their participation rights in decision-making. In occupational health and safety matters, unions had somewhat more rights than in environmental matters (See figure 27).
| Figure 28. Respondents by the number of weekly hours they spent on average on health and safety duties |
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8. Time spent on health and safety duties
Only 45.8% of the respondents gave some figure when they were asked the average number of hours they spend each week on health and safety duties. Most of these said that they spent a maximum of three hours, while 14% said that they spend no time at all on health and safety duties. All of the latter were worker representatives. Health and safety representatives spent more time on health and safety duties (See figure 28).
Only in 44.4% of the workplaces surveyed was the time spent on health and safety duties paid. 44.4% of the respondents said that it is not paid, and 11.1% did not know.
| Figure 29. Workplaces where the respondent's trade union had certain programmes/policies |
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9. Trade union policies/programmes
It is crucial that the union health and safety representative at the workplace can rely on his or her trade union for support, otherwise he or she will rapidly become discouraged. This is important for both policy decisions and technical back-up. In this respect there is much that can be done on the part of the unions according to the Estonian survey. Only 41.2% of the respondents said that their union had a health and safety policy, only 14% that the union had an environmental policy, and 34.6% that the union had a health and safety training programme for worker representatives (See figure 29, and compare to management policies and programmes, figure 21).
10. Record keeping by trade unions
Answers of the respondents to the questions concerning record-keeping were in disagreement. As discussed earlier, only 7.5% of the respondents said that the trade union keeps health records, but 38.9% of the respondents said that the union keeps records on occupational illnesses. Again this may be that "health records" refer to general health not necessarily linked to workplace conditions. Record-keeping was less common among trade unions than among workplace management (Compare figures 22 and 30).
51.6% of the respondents who were employed in workplaces where health and safety records were kept did not give any figure on the number of years they were kept by the union. Where some figure was forthcoming, records were usually kept for 1-5 years with another peak at 11-24 years (See figure 31).
[ Index
| Regional summary | Bulgaria
| Czech Republic | Estonia | Hungary
| Lithuania | Russia
| Slovakia | Ukraine
| Data ]
[ Index | Part I | Part
II | Part III | Part IV
| Part V | Part VI | Part
VII | Part VIII | Summary | Lists
]
