MORRISON FAILS ON WORKPLACE SAFETY

The Morrison Government has failed Australian workers again by refusing to implement the key recommendations of its own review into workplace health and safety.

At a meeting of industrial relations ministers, Michaela Cash has voted down a proposal to introduce model industrial manslaughter laws.

The Labor states of Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, the NT and ACT all voted in favour of the laws, which would hold reckless employers accountable when workers die on the job.

But in one of her first acts as Minister for Industrial Relations, Senator Cash used her vote to kill off the proposal.

More Australians are dying in the workplace under this government, with fatal workplace accidents rising in 2019 for the first time since John Howard was in power. Workers’ compensation claims for serious injuries are also up across many industries.

The Government has spent eight long years trying to smash unions, the very organisations that try to keep workplaces safe.

What the Government should have been doing instead is responding to the Boland Review, which reported more than two years ago and made 34 recommendations designed to keep workers safe, including the introduction of national industrial manslaughter provisions. The Government hasn’t even bothered to respond to the report.

Every single workplace death is preventable. Labor believes every Australian worker should be able to go to work and come home to their loved ones safely.

Scott Morrison and Michaela Cash don’t seem to care.

FRIDAY, 21 MAY 2021