On December 5-6, 2019, in the city of Nur-Sultan, the Republican forum of technical inspectors on labor protection was held on the topic: “Safe labor – the foundation for the successful development of society”
The forum, organized by the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan, was attended by over 50 technical inspectors from all regions of the country, members of trade union organizations, social partners – representatives of central government bodies and non-profit organizations, as well as experts from international organizations and scientists in the field of labor protection.
The main goal of the forum is to strengthen and increase the authority and role of the technical inspector for labor protection and increase the interest of employers in creating production councils as an important link in the management of production risks.
Today, the public control over the state of labor protection in the republic is carried out by 18,810 technical inspectors on labor protection.
Over the past year alone, technical inspectors on labor protection conducted over 106,554 inspections, within the framework of which 145,000 violations of the requirements of labor protection legislation were revealed, as well as participated in the investigation of 327 accidents.
The Federation of Trade Unions declared the year 2018 the Year of Safety and Labor Protection and is actively working in this direction this year.
In all areas of the country, on the initiative of trade unions, the regional programs “Safe Labor” have been approved and are being implemented.
With the active participation of FPRK, the Roadmap for reducing occupational injuries and jobs with harmful working conditions in the Republic of Kazakhstan for 2019-2023 was approved.
As a result of the joint work of social partners, in 2018 compared with 2017, there was a decrease in the number of victims by 6.6%, including fatal by 11.5.
Opening the meeting, First Deputy Chairman of the FPRK Satybaldy Dauletalin noted that the organization of safety at work is a serious social problem.
In this regard, the important role of production councils for safety and labor protection was noted.
“We conducted a fatal accident analysis for 2018. During this period, 221 people died at 191 enterprises. 160 enterprises have proven employer guilt. At 138 enterprises there were no trade union organizations. It means that there was no public control, production councils were not created,” Satybaldy Dauletalin emphasized.
According to him, to date, 14 792 production councils have been created at enterprises of the republic, of which 95% were created on the initiative of trade unions. However, as noted, the number of production councils created is only about 6% of the total number of operating enterprises in the country (261,000).
According to him, the need has ripened for reforming labor legislation in terms of strengthening the role of prevention of accident prevention, developing new mechanisms for implementing the rights and obligations of employers and workers enshrined in the Labor Code.
Satybaldy Dauletalin announced the package of measures proposed by the Federation of Trade Unions to improve the labor protection system.
It is proposed, in particular, to legislate in the Labor Code the priority for the prevention of accidents and occupational diseases.
An equally important issue is the increasing role of insurance tools and mechanisms.
In order to exclude the concealment of injuries by employers, it is proposed to include in the Labor Code norms obliging employers to record any injuries to workers, including microtraumas, which did not lead to loss of working capacity, but represent borderline cases.
The necessity of strengthening the legal status of the Production Councils was also noted, by fixing the mandatory norm for their creation at the legislative level.
Satybaldy Dauletalin made a special emphasis on the issues of material and moral stimulation of the work of technical inspectors.
The Permanent Representative of the WHO in Kazakhstan Oleg Chestnov praised the work of labor unions of Kazakhstan in ensuring labor safety in his video message.
According to him, in 2007 the World Health Assembly approved a global action plan to protect the health of workers and called on all 194 member states to take steps in this direction.
“Based on this plan, a scheme has been created for the development of initiatives to improve jobs using various technologies that our experts have developed to help states and those who organize jobs. I hope that the Republican forum of technical inspectors on labor protection in Kazakhstan will serve the common cause – preserving the health of workers,” Oleg Chestnov emphasized.
The role of labor inspection for trade unions was made by Valentin Mokanu, chief specialist on labor protection and inspection of the Bureau of the International Labor Organization (ILO) in Moscow.
He believes that enhancing the effectiveness of inspection services contributes primarily to strengthening social partnerships. Meanwhile, Valentin Mokanu shared his vision of developing a labor protection system in Kazakhstan.
As a recommendation, the international expert noted the need to strengthen the role of the Committee on Labor, Social Protection and Migration in coordinating the activities of regional labor inspectorates. Along with this, he proposed to increase the number of inspections of enterprises carried out by labor inspectors.
According to V. Mokanu, it is also necessary to legislatively give inspectors the right, at their own discretion, to issue warnings and give consultations instead of applying or recommending the application of sanctions.
Alexander Kryuchkov, the chief technical inspector of the Belarusian Union of Communication Workers, spoke about the practice of trade unions of the Republic of Belarus in organizing public control over industrial safety.
According to the speaker, the effectiveness of the realization by employees of their rights to healthy and safe working conditions is due to the publication in May 2010 of the Decree of the President of the Republic of Belarus “On the exercise of public control by trade unions”.
This decree, as the speaker emphasized, contributed to the improvement of legal regulation of relations in the field of public control by trade unions and their organizational structures, as well as the protection of labor social and economic rights of citizens.
“Public control is exercised by trade unions in accordance with the principles of social partnership between trade unions, state bodies and other organizations. Based on the results of public control, the trade union has the right to issue a recommendation to the controlled entity on eliminating established violations of legislative acts, a collective agreement. The employer is obliged to consider this recommendation and inform the union about the results of its consideration by the deadline set in it. Primary trade union organizations exercise public control only in the entities in which they are created, ”said Alexander Kryuchkov.
The theme of preserving and strengthening the health of workers was continued by the chairman of the Trade Union Center of the city of Nur-Sultan Tastanbek Esentaev during the presentation of the project on the introduction of industrial gymnastics at the country’s enterprises.
In order to improve the working population, on the initiative of the Federation of Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan, in December 2018, a public fund “Kazakhstan Sports and Health Society of Trade Unions” (COOP) was created in the capital.
The main goal of the “COOP” is to assist state and trade union organizations in the field of improving the health of workers, as well as introducing best practices in sports and recreation and sports mass work among workers.
According to the calculations of the PF “KSOOP” project, by 2025 the number of workers involved in physical education and sports can reach 45% (2 million 250 thousand people), and by 2030 60% (3 million people).
A physical pause during the forum was held by the Olympic champion of the country, Bakhtiyar Artayev.
During the panel sessions of the forum, seminars and workshops were held on topical issues of occupational health, the investigation of accidents at the enterprise, the prevention of sudden death at the workplace, the introduction of the world-wide VisionZero concept.
As part of the event, the awarding ceremony of the II Republican contest “Best Technical Inspector” on labor protection FPRK -2019 “was held.
The competition was announced by the Federation of Trade Unions in 2018 as part of the implementation of the tasks of preventing labor protection, creating and maintaining healthy workers.