Safety first

Sometimes it takes a tragedy to spark change – although in this case there have been several such tragedies over many years.

The instigator was a single-vehicle accident on Singapore’s Pan-Island Expressway on June 22. The lorry was carrying foreign workers when it skidded, and came off the road, before tipping. Three of the foreign workers died when they were thrown from the lorry and another 14 were injured. They had been on their way to work, using the only transport provided by their employer.

An estimated 200,000 labourers in Singapore get to work each day on the back of open air lorries. Whilst those travelling in cars, or in the front cabin of such lorries, must by law wear a seatbelt, the transport of workers on the back of a lorry is completely legal. The only real restriction being that they carry a maximum number of passengers – up to one for every four square feet available.

With some employers reluctant to change these transport arrangements, the Singapore Government initiated new safety regulations last year which are now being fast tracked to start in February 2011. But are these regulations enough? Unrestrained passengers will still be allowed on the beds of trucks and lorries, but now there must be side railings of at least 70 centimeters, a canopy and wet weather cover. The amount of space per passenger has also been increased to eight square feet.

Halimah Yacob, Deputy Secretary General of the National Trades Union Congress, says this is an important step. But more should be taken. “Apart from the higher side railings and canopies, I feel that an added precaution will be safety belts,” she tells HRM, adding that more stringent licensing requirements are also needed for foreign drivers. “The best option is for workers to be carried in buses as lorries are meant for goods and not people.”

Yacob was one of several parliamentarians who successfully argued for a fast-tracked introduction of the new laws. Originally scheduled to apply from 2012, concern voiced after the June 22 accident helped convince Minister for Transport Raymond Lim to speed up the timetable. The regulations will now apply to light lorries, registered since 1 January 2010, from February next year; with older and heavy lorries expected to meet requirements by 1 August 2011.

John Gee, President of the Transient Workers Count Too advocacy group, has welcomed the fast-forward regulations but says the overall impact on safety will be minimal. “The canopy goes to protection from the elements,” he says. “That’s not a safety feature as such.

“The higher railings on the sides will give some enhanced protection but it’s not like having an enclosed shell. In a collision, there will be no (extra) protection.”

Instead, Gee urges businesses considering upgrading their lorries to go one step further and get ahead of the law.

“We’d encourage businesses to take the next step pretty quickly,” Gee says – speaking about a move to all transport being undertaken in fully enclosed vehicles. “Investing in those changes will have a much longer term impact.”

His organisation is urging the Land Transport Authority to work toward this end solution. “We realise that this will impose additional costs upon contractors, but consider that the toll in lost lives and injuries under existing arrangements could be significantly reduced by this means.”

The business case

Any employers reluctant to make the necessary changes should also be reminded of the business case for improved safety. Every accident costs an organistion in terms of healthcare, downtime, reduced employee morale, and in the worst case scenarios, compensation payments. Investments that reduce those risks will find their way to the bottom line, even if the financial benefits are not immediately quantifiable.

Yacob says whatever short term savings businesses make from transporting workers unsafely are not worth the risk. “Cost is not a valid trade off for workers’ safety.”

She also highlights how unsafe transport provisions negate many of the positive steps taken to improve workplace safety. While businesses of all sizes have worked hard to combat workplace injuries, the same attitude is not shared when it comes to ferrying workers there and back. “It is double standards to impose stringent safety requirements at the workplace but to expect much lower standards the minute the worker leaves the factory gate,” she says.

What’s more, accidents or fatalities occurred transporting workers do not count as a workplace incidents. Workplace deaths are recorded on one ledger – and have been happily falling in recent years – while road accidents, even those transporting workers to and from the workplace, become part of the national road toll only.

Just a few years?

Gee says there is significant public pressure to end the practice of open-backed lorry transport altogether, with a number of Parliamentarians already registering their support. Despite the costs to employers of changing the practice, Gee is optimistic, saying it is only a matter of time before the new regulations are superseded by a blanket ban. “I’d say this will happen within two or three years.”

Let’s hope so.