Labour not part of mining safety

 THE Labour and Industrial Relations Department administers and regulates the Industrial Safety, Health and Welfare Act which is not applicable to the mining lease area, an official says.

Executive manager for the occupational health and safety programme, Donald Lunen, said that in response to a letter to the editor published in The National on April 8. 

The letter said the OHS programme in the country was not regulated, administered and enforced.

Lunen said the OHS policies, legislations, institutions and values were inherited from the colonial era and were prescriptive and evolved in a piecemeal manner. “This is because its scope is narrowly focusing on the industrial revolution pre-occupation with factories and does not cover all work places in the industries,” Lunen said.

The letter stated some cases of deplorable working conditions and flawed work practices which had contributed to atrocities in workplaces, such as the 2009 landslide at the Kainantu gold field.

Lunen said due to constrains and the incapacity of the department to inspect the whole nation, it was imperative that all work places must have a safety policy and a safety management system.