The Occupational Safety and Health Act (OSHA) is one with a difference. The labour movement has been pressing for the implementation of the Act, many business leaders have declared their support for it and Prime Minister Patrick Manning has identified February 17 as the date on which he expects the Act to take effect.

OSHA is special not simply because a general consensus exists, in and outside of Parliament, on the need for the safety and protection of the worker. It is significant because of how it seeks to treat with the worker, seeing him or her not simply as an employee who helps a business realise its profit potential—one more “cog” in the wheel of production.

Church teaching is clear about the attention that must be given to the safety and well-being of the worker. In his encyclical Centessimus Annus John Paul II writes: “When man is seen more as a producer or consumer of goods than as a subject who produces and consumes in order to live, then economic freedom loses its necessary relationship to the human person and ends up by alienating and oppressing him” (par 39).

Although passed since January 2004, OSHA is once more before Parliament with amendments. Not all labour unions agree with the proposed changes, the Opposition has its reservations, but no one wants to see any obstacles put in the way of enforcing the OSHA. Some, indeed, felt it should have been promulgated long before now, and that any amendments could have come later.

Value of the worker

The lengthy but comprehensive Act considers the varied areas of safety and health in the workplace. Its purview includes the general duties of employers to their employees; of “occupiers”—those persons who have “ultimate control” in industrial establishments—to the safety and health of the public; and of employees at work.

It states the rights of employees to refuse work where safety or health is in danger. It sets out the requirements for the employment of young persons. It makes provision for the setting up of an Occupational Safety and Health Authority.

OSHA is significant because it takes the value of the worker to another level. Unemployment and wage levels are important issues, but they should never cause society to lose sight of the value of the worker as a person, as a life to be protected.

The enactment of laws, by itself, will not solve problems. But laws can send important messages to citizens and can influence society in positive ways.

Labour Minister Danny Montano is right in saying, during last week's parliamentary debate, that legislation alone will not save lives at the workplace and that employers and employees have to develop a culture of safety. But the legislation can serve such a culture.

A photograph on the front page of one of our daily newspapers two weeks ago, showing a construction worker doing a balancing act on a steel beam for the camera, suggests a poor safety culture.

Many are the voices that speak to us in the age of new media, many can seem to be grace-filled and of God when they are not. The voice that speaks from within OSHA is one that deserves everyone's attention.