Occupational Safety & Health (Part IV) cont’d…
Assessment for hazardous chemical
WHERE SO prescribed, an employer shall assess all chemicals and biological agents produced in the workplace for use therein to determine if they are hazardous.

The assessment required shall be in writing and a copy of it shall be –
(a) made available by the employer in the workplace in such a manner as to allow examination by the workers;

(b) furnished by the employer to the committee or safety and health representative, if any, for the workplace or to a worker selected by the workers to represent them, if there is no committee of safety and health representative.
Hazardous physical agents
A person who distributes or supplies, directly or indirectly, or manufactures, produces or designs an article for use in a workplace that causes, emits or produces a hazardous physical agent when the article is in use or operation shall ensure that such information as may be prescribed is readily available respecting the hazardous physical agent and the proper use or operation of the article.

Where an employer has an article as described above in the workplace, the employer shall ensure that the information referred to has been obtained and is:
(a) Made available in the workplace for workers who use or operate the article or who are likely to be exposed to the hazardous physical agent; and

(b) furnished by the employer to the committee or safety and health representative, if any, for the workplace or a worker selected by the workers to represent them, if there is no committee or safety and health representative.
An employer to whom this subsection of the Act applies shall post prominent notices identifying and warning of the hazardous physical agent in the part of the workplace in which the article is used or operated or is to be used or operated.

Notices as required shall contain such information as may be prescribed and shall be in English and such other language or languages as may be prescribed.

Instruction and training
In addition to providing information and instruction to a worker as required by Section 46 (2)(a) of the Act, an employer shall ensure that a worker exposed or likely to be exposed to a hazardous chemical or to a hazardous physical agent receives, and that the worker participates in, such instruction and training as may be prescribed.

The instruction and training to be given shall be developed and implemented by the employer in consultation with the committee or safety and health representative, if any, for the workplace.

Article 66 (3) of the Act says: An employer shall review, in consultation with the committee or safety and health representative, if any, for the workplace, the training and instruction provided to a worker and the worker’s familiarity therewith, at least annually.

The review described above shall be held more frequently than annually, if:
(a) The employer, on the advice of the committee or safety and health representative, if any, for the workplace, determines that such reviews are necessary; or

(b) there is a change in circumstances that may affect the safety or health worker.
Confidential business information
Article 67 (1) of the Act states: An employer may file a claim with the Minister for an exemption from disclosing:
(a) Information required under this Part in an inventory’, label or chemical safety data sheet; or

(b) the name of a toxicological study used by the employer to prepare a chemical safety data sheet,
on the grounds that it is confidential business information and that disclosure of such information to a competitor would be liable to cause harm to an employer’s business, so long as the safety and health of workers are not compromised thereby.

67. (2): An application under Subsection (1) shall be made only in respect of such types of confidential business information as may be prescribed.

67. (3):  Any worker of the employer or any trade union representing the workers of the employer may file with the Minister a rebuttal to the claim made by the employer under Subsection (1).

67. (4): The Minister shall make a determination or direct the Commissioner to make a determination on his behalf, on every claim made under Subsection (1), and on every rebuttal made under Subsection (3).

67. (5):  Information that an employer considers to be confidential business information is exempt from disclosure, from the time a claim is filed under Subsection (1), until the claim is finally determined, and for three years thereafter, if the claim is found to be valid.

NOTIFICATION OF ACCIDENTS AND OCCUPATIONAL DISEASES
Interpretation

In this Part, ‘employer’ includes any body of persons, corporate or incorporate, and the legal personal representative of a deceased employer.  Where the services of a worker are temporarily lent or let on hire to another person by the person with whom the worker has entered into a contract of service or apprenticeship, the latter shall, for the purposes of this Act, be deemed to continue to be the employer of the worker whilst he is working for that other person.  In relation to a person plying for hire with any vehicle or vessel, the use of which is obtained by that person under a contract of bailment (other than higher-purchase agreement), the person from whom the use of the vessel or vehicle is so obtained shall, for the purposes of this Act, be deemed to be the employer; and in relation to a person employed for the purpose of any gain or recreation and engaged or paid through a club, the manager or members of the managing committee of the club, shall for time purposes of this Act, be deemed to be the employer.

Notification of accidents

Where any accident arising out of and in the course of the employment of any worker occurs and:
(a) causes loss of life to such worker; or

(b) disables such worker, for more than one day, from earning full wages at the work at which he was employed at the time of such accident,
written notice of the accident in the Form and accompanied by the particulars set out in the First Schedule (outlined later), shall forthwith, in the case of paragraph (a) amid within four days in the case of paragraph (b), be sent by the employer to the Authority and the committee, safety and health representative or trade union, if  any.

Article 69 (2) of the Act states: Where any accident causing disablement has been notified under this section, and after such notification the accident results in the death of the person disabled, notice in writing of the death shall forthwith be sent by the employer to the Authority and the committee, safety and health representative or trade union, if any, as soon as the fact of the death comes to the knowledge of the employer.

69. (3): Where an accident causing disablement has been notified under this section and the said disablement has ceased, notice in writing of the date when the disablement ceased shall be sent by the employer to the Authority and the committee, safety and health representative or trade union if any within two weeks from that date, the Form and accompanied by the particulars set out in the Second Schedule (outlined later).

Any employer who fails to comply with the requirements of these subsections of the Act shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine of not less than ten thousand dollars nor more than fifty thousand dollars and to imprisonment for three months.

Article 69 (5) of the Act states: Where any accident to which this section applies occurs to a worker whose services are for the time being temporarily lent or let on lure to another person by the employer, such other person shall, if he fails to report the accident to the employer immediately, be guilty of an offence, and the employer shall not be liable under the provisions of Subsection (4) unless it is established that he knew of the accident.

Where a person loses his life or is disabled, no person shall, except for the purpose of:
(a) saving life or relieving human suffering;

(b) maintaining an essential public utility service or a public transportation system; or

(c) preventing unnecessary damage to equipment or other property, interfere with, disturb, destroy, alter or carry away any wreckage or article at the scene or connected with the occurrence which gave rise to loss of life or disablement until permission so to do has been given by an inspector.
69. (7): A register of all accidents to which this section applies shall he kept by the employer in the form prescribed by regulations made under this Act.

Notification of occupational diseases and other diseases
70. (1):  Every qualified medical practitioner attending on or called in to visit a patient whom he believes to be suffering from occupational disease contracted in the course of his employment as a worker shall, unless such a notice has been previously sent, forthwith send, addressed to the Authority a notice stating the name and full postal address of the patient and the disease from which in the opinion of such medical practitioner, the patient is suffering and the name and address of the place at which, and of the employer by whom, he is or was last employed.

70. (2): If any qualified medical practitioner fails to send any notice in accordance with the requirements of this section, he shall be liable on summary conviction to a fine of not less than ten thousand dollars nor more than thirty thousand dollars.

70. (3):  Any employer who believes or suspects, or has reasonable grounds for believing or suspecting that a case of occupational disease has occurred among the workers employed by him, shall forthwith send written notice of such case, in the form, and accompanied by the particulars, set out in the Third Schedule (outlined in a later presentation) to the Authority and to the committee, safety and health representative or trade union, if any, and to the Local Sanitary Authority of, and, in the case of workers employed in industrial establishments, to the medical inspector for the area within which the place of employment of such workers is situated, and the provisions of this Act with respect to the notification of accidents shall apply to any such case in like manner as to any such accident as is mentioned in these provisions.

70. (4):  If an employer is advised by or on behalf of a worker that a claim in respect of a “prescribed disease” as defined in the Third Schedule of the National Insurance and Social Security Act has benefited with the National Insurance Board by or on behalf of the worker, the employer shall give notice in writing within four days of being so advised, to the Authority and to the committee, safety and health representative or trade union, if any, containing such information and particulars as are prescribed.

70. (5):  The Minister may, as respects any class or description of place where workers are employed, by regulations made under this Act apply this section to any disease, other than an occupational disease.
Here ends my presentation on Part IV.  I will commence Part V discussing Inquest in case of death by accident or occupational disease.
*The writer is the former General Secretary of the Clerical & Commercial Workers’ Union (CCWU) and also a former President of the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Guyana (FITUG) and a former Vice President of the Guyana Trades Union Congress (GTUC). He served the Caribbean Congress of Labour (CCL) as Research Officer 1983 – 1998.