OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH & SAFETY

Occupational Health & Safety

Table of Content

CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION2

Research Background2

Aim and Objective5

CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW7

Hazards7

Outcomes10

The context of workplace hazards12

Focusing on people14

Focusing on management issues17

Techniques for dealing with hazards in the workplace19

Safe place strategies20

Safe person strategies23

Safe system strategies26

The building blocks of an OHS MS28

Application of the safe place, safe person, safe systems framework - preliminary pilot study results31

Consequences of changes in the work environment on public and occupational health and safety38

Flexible working time and over-time work38

Types of employment contracts - organizational flexibility - job insecurity42

Public safety46

Women, young and elderly workers47

Social consequences49

CHAPTER 3: METHODOLOGY51

Research Design51

CHAPTER 4: RESULT AND DISCUSSION53

Risk assessment and prevention in a changing work environment53

Scope of the Problem59

Globalization of Work and of the Workforce60

Youth and Older Workers64

Public Health Approach66

Government Role74

Role of Organized Labor88

CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION90

REFERENCES94

Chapter 1: Introduction

During recent years the work environment has undergone significant changes regarding working time, years of employment, work organization, type of employment contracts and working conditions ([EASHW, 2002b] and [Storrie, 2002]). For example, changes may include increase of retirement age, increase in daily and weekly working hours, “deregulation” of working hours, temporary and part-time work, labour leasing, outsourcing, subcontracting, self-employment, down-sizing of enterprises, increased workload and time pressure for workers.

These changes have already been implemented in several acts of legislation within the European Union (EU), such as Directive 2003/88/EC on Working Time, Directives 97/81/EC - 98/23/EC on Part-time Work and Directive 1999/70/EC on Fixed-term Work ([Council Directive, 2003/88/EC], [Council Directive, 1997/81/EC], [Council Directive, 1998/23/EC] and [Council Directive, 1999/70/EC]).

Research Background

Many studies in Europe and worldwide have revealed data regarding theses changes. Data may differ depending on the country and the study group (EASHW, 2002a), however, they are useful for stressing the changes in the work environment. The presentation that follows is not exhaustive, since this is beyond the scope of the paper.

Regarding working time, in 2005 the 4th European working conditions survey reports that in the EU-27, 50% of employees of the study group have flexible daily working hours, 40% had no definite starting and finishing time for the working day, 30% work flexible working days per week and 20% work 1-3 Sundays per month (EASHW, 2007a). More than 15% of employees worked over 48 h a week. In 75% of cases examined, working hours and schedules were solely defined by employers.

Another study reports that in 2006, 18.1% of workers were involved in part-time work (31.1% female and 7.7% male workers) (EFILWC, 2008).

An important factor, related to increased diversity of working time patterns, is the increase of work intensity in all European countries. Some effects of this increased work intensity are the extended practice of weekend work, the increase of working time schedules with irregular and less predictable working hours, and the use of excessively short (involuntary) part-time work or excessively long working hours (involuntary over-time) (EASHW, 2002a).

Data regarding the type of employment contracts are also reported in the literature (EASHW, 2002b). According to the Labour Force Survey (LFS) by Eurostat, between 1994 and 2000 the proportion of employees under fixed-term contracts increased ...