Whoever claims to be ‘without sin’ should reflect well before casting the first stone.

Politics, Garrett style, was not intended to cause harm or death.
That came with the patch someone in the labor machine forced upon him once he won his ‘raffle’.
The poor lad is probably, by now, beside himself with self-loathing through falling for the trap.

There are two ways of looking at the situation.
Peter, maybe, should have equipped himself with some comprehensive world wisdom before entering his new career –
And (not or) the machine he works for should have insisted he was equipped to do the job before he signed on for the job.

There is the aspect that Howard and his crew did manage to chew the hell out of industry safety standards at a time when many occupational/safety people had reached retirement or had decided that it was worth more than their pensions to argue the toss.

This author believes the fault lies at the base level of communications.
There have been too many skills lost at the technical levels within governance while at the same time the double effect of communications overload combined with a complete lack of ‘world skills’ at the advisory level has divorced even the most well-meaning of our legislators from reality.

My hobby involves electrics and my work history includes exposure to
Safety at work is a daily thing for me, sadly exposure to workplace death is too.
Here in this forum a thread once was highly critical of laws that forbid do it your self electrics, it happens
Once a very long time ago My weekend job was demolition, of houses.
On lifting roofs a spider web of bad wiring was often exposed.
a trade unionist I quite often show my concerns at horrible employers, usually of casual or contract labour.
Who give basically useless training then send boys to do mens work.
Work cover as we know it in NSW is a dreadful horrible failure, self funded it is a coffee club refuge and hiding place for slothful uncaring types.
Yes the deaths need not have taken place,tradesmen should only do such work,but Garrett, can we admit some push their own agendas at any cost, this wheel barrow is up side down, it is going no place and exists only as a tool to inflict insults on the ALP , surely No one can believe our system relies on one man.
Work cover a true story.
Phone rang in an office a workers says .
can you help, it is raining we are sitting in the rain no lunch room no toilets no first aid nothing.
Boss got a call we would like to have a look at your site , load abusive threats followed.
Work cover is asked to come look too.
Next morning boss, yep boss and work cover go over site together.
WC inspector watches as boss asks every individual do we need sheds ext?
Every answer is no.
On arriving to be informed work cover watch bosses and Foreman scream abuse at? me.
I tell WC and boss inspection must start again, me and useless idiot WC.
Boss stays in Ute fuming.
EVERY MAN on that job informed WC he was an idiot and DEMANDED WC standards, yes theirs on site.
WC thanked me a said he had learned something that day I doubt it.

Belly; can you help, it is raining we are sitting in the rain no lunch room no toilets no first aid nothing.

Where were they working?

How did they get there?

Surely they had cars they could have sat in until the rain passed.

Further evidence that we are breeding a society of pussies, not men, pussies!

Imagine if our brave soldiers who faught and died for what we have today had carried on like this.

God help us if a war breaks out here, as we have to rely on these pussies to defend us. Trouble is, once the paperwork is in place and all the safety checks have been performed, the war will have been lost.

Do they make porta loos and potrable lunch rooms in camo colours?

Speaking for myself, I contracted to both Telstra and Optus for over 10 years. In all that time, AFAIK not a single death was caused by electrocution, despite the literally thousands of people crawling in roof spaces and under houses, drilling into walls and through floors and ceilings and working on live power poles. Not a union in sight, although I was personally a union member (ETU/CEPU) for personal (and since much-changed thanks to that experience) philosophical reasons, rather than any benefit to be gained.

What was the difference? Firstly, adequate training was provided by the telcos. Secondly, there were no middle-men - all contractors were responsible for their own work and forbidden to subcontract to anyone else. Thirdly, the client was the telco, not the homeowner, which meant that if the homeowner wanted something done that was not safe, refusal was always an easy option.

The insulation debacle is a gross failure for the Union movement. Belly comes on here and tells us how he "saved" some wet workers from themselves; where was the union movement when the obviously inadequate training programs were being delivered to these poor young blokes? No doubt writing stringent new protocols to protect themselves from paper cuts or wet toilet seats.

Rehctub,

Don't be an Rs, an employer is required to a safe workplace with basic amenities by the OH&S act and the employees have a right to complain. While there are many instances of unions abusing the rights, this is not one of them.

Likewise, an employer needs to follow safety guidelines and required training for any task. Supposedly installation of roof insulation requires only basic training.

As far as Garret is concerned, his actions are reprehensible. He was notified by the electrician's union that there were legitimate safety issues with the installation of foil insulation, and instead of taking immediate action and stopping the use of foil he "negotiated" with the unions for a compromise that would not affect his program.

With the continued use of the foil, and the poor communication to the installers, it was likely that some of the installers would continue using metal staples and fatalities were highly likely. His actions circumvented the normal safety procedures, and if not protected by parliamentry priviledge could lead to criminal prosecution.

With the unions so tied to labor, it is interesting to see whether they will pursue this issue with the same vigour that they do with employers, or whether they will continue with the protection of their buddies.

The government's job is to remove all risk whatsoever. Since getting out of bed involves risk, I expect the government to bring me breakfast in bed every morning. After all, it's only my basic human right, properly understood.