HEARING REVEALS BUSH REGIME’S
ABANDONMENT OF ERGONOMICS

The anti-worker GOP Bush regime’s abandonment of enforcing job safety and health standards when ergonomic injuries come up is even larger than official government data show.

That came out in testimony by Bush Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, defending her department’s budget proposals to the very-critical Senate Labor Appropriations subcommittee on May 7. Ergonomics was just one of several flash points between the Right Wing Bush regime official and several senators from both parties.

Chao told panel chairman Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) the Occupational Safety and Health Administration inspected 700 workplaces for ergonomic injuries last year. That’s even though ergonomic injuries--including musculoskeletal disorders when workers are hurt on the job by actions such as repetitive motions, lifting, turning and hauling--totaled 375,540 in 2006, the last year for which data are available.

She also claimed ergonomic injuries fell by 22% since 2002, though she did not provide figures to back that--and did not mention her DOL put through a rule before 2002 saying businesses did not have to keep separate counts of ergonomic injuries.

But the 700-inspection estimate turned out to be high. Harkin, quoting from DOL’S own “performance and accountability report,” said the real number was 449.

That didn’t deter Chao, who claimed “we’ve had the best injury and illness rate and lowest workplace fatality rate ever. We’ve helped workplaces become safer.” Harkin countered with Labor Department data showing workplace death rates rose from 2005-2006, as did the number of fatalities. “And fatalities among Hispanic workers decreased from 2002-2003, and then shot up” to 990 in 2006, a record, he added.

He also said ergonomics would not go away. “It still is one of the highest reasons for people losing time on the job. This will have to be addressed by the next administration. And if I’m here next year, we’ll get on it,” promised Harkin, who is up for re-election this fall.

“We have enforcement, outreach, education and compliance assistance,” Chao responded, referring to OSHA’s advice to businesses followed by exempting them from inspections. “But we can do better.”

Other disagreements between Chao and the senators included:

• DOL’s decision, revealed in Government Accountability Office report released that morning, to award approximately 90% of High Growth Job Training grants since 2001 without competitive bidding--and without holding grantees to results they promised to achieve. Harkin compared the grants to now-controversial congressional earmarks, saying that at least lawmakers have to put them on record, and follow up for results.
  
  
• “Your own inspector general quoted your department as saying ‘It’s not necessary or valuable to evaluate all grant activities,” an incredulous Harkin said. Chao responded the grants were a pilot program, and they’re now being awarded competitively. Harkin noted that occurred only because, last year, the Democratic-run Congress ordered competition to occur for the money.
  
  
• Whether OSHA’s injury and illness data are accurate. Harkin, citing outside studies, said there appears to be widespread underreporting of injuries and illnesses on the job, when the agency’s numbers are compared with those from workers’ comp programs and other official sources. Harkin and two other senators have asked the non-partisan Government Accountability Office to probe the underreporting. Chao said she doubted it occurs.
  
  
• The future sites for a small program called Youth Build, designed to help train at-risk youngsters in building trades. The $25 million program now distributes $5 million grants to each of five major cities. Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) wants money to help cities combating crime waves, specifically citing Philadelphia. But Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) said more should go to the Gulf Coast, still ravaged by Katrina. Chao did not respond to Specter but told Cochran “we’ll take a look at your suggestion.”
  
  
• Labor enforcement. Chao strongly defended the increased money under the anti-worker GOP Bush regime for the Office of Labor-Management Standards, the small agency in DOL that gathers and publicizes union financial data, letting workers’ enemies grab it. She said the office needs more money to enforce its new rules for required union LM-2 and LM-30 reports.
  
  

LM-2s force unions to disclose spending on virtually everything from pencils to paychecks of staffers, plus how much time staffers spend on everything from organizing to community service to activism. The LM-30s require individual unionists, even if they’re unpaid--such as people serving as shop stewards--to disclose their personal finances, including mortgage loans, car loans and college loans, in intimate detail.

The encounter over the labor enforcement office--a favorite agency of the Radical Right National Right to Work Committee--produced a show of temper from Chao. “There seems to be some angst among some special-interest groups over this,” she snapped. “This office is one-tenth of 1% of our total budget. We’re just trying to restore the budget and enforce the law.”