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Global unions kick off safe-at-work campaign for pulp and paper

April 29, 2019 – Following 2019 Workers’ Memorial Day on April 28, workers in the pulp, paper, graphical and packaging sectors represented globally by IndustriALL Global Union and UNI kicked off a yearlong campaign around the three fundamental worker rights needed to make work safe.

The rights are:

1. The Right to Know: Workers must know the hazards and risks in their workplace
2. The Right to Act: Commonly known as the Right to Refuse Unsafe Work Without Punishment
3. The Right to Participate: Workers have the right to participate in the safety programs and structures that manage safety in the workplace. 

May and June 2019 will focus on a Worker’s Right to Know. Right to Know laws typically focus on a workers right to know the hazardous substances and dangerous chemicals they work with, but workers require information on so much more that that could endanger them at work. 

For example:

• Information on all workplace hazard information, including dangerous chemicals and materials but also hazardous tools, equipment, work processes and the way work is organized.
• An accurate evaluation of hazards. Where gaps in knowledge exist they should be filled.
• Hazard and risk assessment done with workers’ participation: the only people with the moral authority to assess a risk are those who must face it – this means industrial hygiene surveys belong to workers. Toxicology studies belong to workers. Ergonomic surveys belong to workers.

“We invite the global pulp, paper and packaging sectors to work with workers and their representatives to fully facilitate the right to know and by doing so build safer and healthier workplaces,” says Joaquina Rodriguez, president of UNI Graphical and Packaging.

“All health and safety standards exist because of trade union action and we invite the pulp, paper, graphical and packaging industries to share information and build safety programs together with their workers who know the work and its hazards better than anyone one else,” says Leeann Foster, co-chair of the IndustriALL Pulp and Paper Working Group.

Similar international mobilizations will be conducted in September/October 2019 around the Right to Act, and March/April 2020 will focus on the Right to Participate before culminating in Workers’ Memorial Day 2020.

Workers’ Memorial Day, observed by unions across the globe on April 28 of each year, is a day dedicated to remember those who have suffered and died on the job and to renew the struggle for safe jobs. Worldwide, each year more than 380,000 workers die tragically at work and another 2.4 million die from work-related illness.

The two international unions IndustriALL Global Union and UNI Global Union bring together unions on all continents across these industries.