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House Bill Set to Block Bush’s Secret Chemical Exposure Rule |
The Bush administration’s secret rule that could increase workers’ exposure to dangerous chemicals and toxins and make it more difficult for the next administration to enact new safety rules will meet a congressional roadblock next week when legislation to stop it is introduced.
With the Department of Labor trying to keep details of the proposal secret as it attempts to fast track it, Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, this morning announced he will introduce legislation to force the administration to drop the plan.
The proposed rule—copies of which have been obtained by news organizations—is being pushed by Bush political appointees over the objections of career safety and health experts.
It would change the way risks to workers posed by dangerous workplace chemicals are measured and could increase workers’ exposure. It also would add an extra step to the rulemaking process for any new rules restricting the amount of chemical and toxic substance exposure to workers—in effect, giving corporations another tool to fight and delay safety regulations and making it more difficult for a pro-worker safety administration to implement new regulations.
Says Miller:
This secret regulation is an attempt by the Bush administration and the business community to fundamentally weaken the scientific process for enacting new regulations that protect American workers.
For nearly eight years, this administration has consistently failed to respond in a meaningful way to the real health and safety threats workers face while on the job. But now they will stop at nothing to rush through a secret rule that will tie the hands of health and safety experts when responding to our nation’s critical health and safety threats.
Celeste Monforton, an occupational health and safety expert at the George Washington University School of Public Health, told The Washington Post:
This is all about making sure no new safety regulations do get out.
Earlier this week, Miller and Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) sent Labor Secretary Elaine Chao a letter urging her to abandon the move to fast track the proposed rule.
There are long-established directives to ensure that the administration acts in a transparent manner so that the public has the time and ability to properly consider all proposals. It appears that the Department may be violating those rules.
We are likewise concerned that the Department would seek a rule change in near total secrecy to this point—a change that will have a detrimental impact on the health and safety of American workers.
In its entire time in office, the Bush administration has issued just one rule to limit worker exposure to a chemical—hexavalent chromium—and that was by court order.
This last-minute, fast-track push to change the chemical exposure rule comes while dozens of important workplace safety and health rules remain buried in the Bush administration. Those proposals include a crane safety standard, as well as rules to protect workers from exposure to dangerous substances and chemicals such as silica, which can cause serious respiratory disease; diacetyl, a flavoring additive linked to “popcorn lung”; and beryllium, a light metal that can cause lung damage, especially to metal and dental workers.
In addition, the Bush administration refuses to develop combustible dust rules that could help prevent explosions like the one in February’s at an Imperial Sugar plant that killed 13 workers.
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As the safety chair of a local union for many years, the thought of secret regulations sends chills up my spine. I worked with a witche’s brew of chemicals as did my coworkers. some developed some quite serious illnesses and the cancer rate of my respective “container” plant was high, very much over the national average. alas, no one kept track of just how many workers did die of cancer.
If the Bush folks get this into law, he needs to be impeached. If the congress okes this, they also need to join the unemployment line.
In the small community of Endicott, New York;
IBM flourished during its nearly 100 year corporate career.
During a 30-40year period, many of its 12,000 employees
were exposed to hundreds of different chemicals. The “Right To Know” laws appeared in the 1970’s-1980’s and revealed what those chemicals handling hazards were. Still, hundreds of employees were exposed to those chemicals anyway. Not only IBM employees; but trade union workers, i.e., Carpenters, Electricians, Painters, Plumbers and Custodial Service Workers.
IBM documented and tracked IBM employees health, quite well.
In 2007, NIOSH agreed to do a health study of the IBM employees records, to determine if IBM workers were more likely to get cancer, etc. from these exposures, than the general population of Endicott and surrounding areas. IBM did not resist. However, most of the trade union workers health, previously mentioned, were not documented and tracked like the IBM employees (non-union).
Now that NIOSH is doing the study of IBM workers (a study advocated by Alliance@IBM CWA Local 1701, who is organizing IBM); they are also interested in bringing in the trade union workers data.
The problem is: Most of the unions don’t have it; yet many of those same workers from that 30-40 year period, have died or have serious health problems because of working inside that plant.
We need to be going the opposite direction that Bush’s Labor Sec’y and administration is taking us. Labor Secretary Elaine Chao is hazardous to our health!