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South Africa's miners have approved an offer from the last three gold firms to settle with the National Union of Mineworkers, the NUM announced in Johannesburg this afternoon. 
 
The deal with Goldfields, Harmony and DRD means that the NUM can now sign a national agreement on wages and conditions with the Chamber of Mines, thus averting strikes in South Africa's biggest-employing sector. 
 
For the first time ever in a national bargaining round, the NUM has secured all of its demands. These include a minimum monthly wage of 2 000 Rand (about US$ 244) by the year 2002. The basic minimum is an entry point amount for miners joining the industry. At present, their monthly pay ranges from 1 200 to 1 600 Rand (about US$ 146 to 195). Increased annual leave is another gain. 
 
The campaign was also remarkable for the support that the union received from a number of major gold investors, shocked by the conditions under which this high-value commodity is mined. In South Africa's mines, low pay rates have long been mirrored by high accident rates. Recently, however, union-management cooperation has gone some way towards cutting the number of deaths and injuries. 
 
At the global level, the NUM is affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). &quot;The NUM has conducted a strong, well-structured campaign,&quot; said ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs today. &quot;We congratulate South African mineworkers on their achievement.&quot; 
 
The following is the full text of a statement issued this afternoon by NUM Vice-President Crosby Moni: 
 
Today we bring good news for the mining industry and the country as a whole. 
 
The 2001 wage review between the National Union of Mineworkers and the employers is regarded by us as negotiations with a difference. For the first time in our history none of the original demands tabled by the union had to be removed from the negotiations. Every one of the issues put forward was an attempt by the union to put the industry on an irrevocable path towards transformation for a humane and caring industry. 
 
The fact that employers have found agreement with us on these important issues that aim to improve the quality of working life on the mines, means that we will tread this path together. 
 
We must also add that for the first time we had received messages of support from gold investors through the world who, whilst afraid of the impact of a looming strike were horrified to hear of the conditions under which miners in South Africa labour. They were very sympathetic with our demands, especially those in dispute. 
 
Last night Branch Leaders who were part of our negotiating team reported back to members on the settlement offer in respect of Goldfields, Harmony and DRD. We are pleased to announce that members voted unanimously in support of these proposals. We are therefore in a position to conclude the negotiation with the Chamber [of Mines] and sign off the 2001 Agreement on Wages and Working Conditions. We now look forward to its implementation. 
 
We declared 2001 the Year of the Member. In these negotiations they were consulted every step of the way. They showed unity, commitment and purpose in this round. For this I, on behalf of the National Office Bearers and the National Executive Committee, wish to think them profusely for their stance. This agreement is theirs.

South African Mining Settlement

Norwegian oil and petrochemical workers' union NOPEF faces court proceedings over its notice of a boycott against Trico Marine. The Norwegian union has threatened to black the firm because of its union-busting in the US. 
 
Trico's Norwegian subsidiary Trico Supply ASA said yesterday that it wants a court ruling on the boycott. 
 
In a letter to the company, NOPEF has once again put forward a simple solution - if Trico confirms in writing that it respects international standards on freedom of organisation in its US operations, then the Norwegian union will consider calling off the boycott. 
 
The Norwegian union has also provided a draft text for the company to sign. The proposed declaration is as follows: 
 
It is the policy of Trico Marine Services, Inc, USA that the employees themselves should decide whether they wish to be organised in a trade union or not - without interference from the company's side. Employees who choose to organise will not be subjected to harassment, discrimination or threats from the management side. 
 
Trico Marine Services, Inc, USA ensures that employees within the company enjoy adequate protection against any discrimination that constitutes an attack on the right to organise - i.e. against dismissal or other molestations resulting from membership of or participation in a trade union. Nobody who seeks employment in the company shall risk rejection of a job application on the grounds of trade union activity. 
 
Trico Marine Services, Inc, USA will respect the employees' choice by recognising Offshore Mariners United if the employees of the concern choose to organise within that union. 
 
[translated from the Norwegian] 
 
A modest enough draft statement, but the company apparently has no intention of signing it. 
 
&quot;We answered that point earlier and our answer is the same now,&quot; Trico Supply ASA's Managing Director Jon Arild Goks&oslash;yr told the Norwegian newspaper Sunnm&oslash;rsposten. In other words, the company is standing by its claim that it respects the right to organise everywhere. 
 
This is strongly disputed by the unions. The company respects organising rights in Norway. But in the US, it is actively anti-union. 
 
&quot;We have decided to get a court ruling on the boycott, and we are sticking to that,&quot; Goks&oslash;yr added. &quot;For us, there's nothing new in this letter.&quot; 
 
Meanwhile, Norwegian legislators Marit Nybakk and Hallgeir Langeland have asked the country's Minister of Trade and Industry to put pressure on Den norske bank (the Norwegian bank) concerning its loans to Trico. The call has been backed by the Norwegian Labour Party, and NOPEF will be meeting Nybakk about the affair on 6 August. The matter has now been raised with Minister of Finance Karl Eirik Schj&oslash;tt-Pedersen. 
 
NOPEF has already persuaded oil company Norsk Hydro to halt negotiations with Trico on the chartering of vessels, and the Norwegian-headquartered energy multinational Statoil is also currently examining its options. 
 
At the global level, NOPEF is affiliated to the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) and the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF). 
 
The ICEM, in cooperation with the ITF, has been in contact with senior Statoil management on this issue and has emphasised that Statoil, as a major Trico customer, could use its influence to help resolve the question of trade union recognition in the US. 
 
In 1998, the ICEM, NOPEF and Statoil signed the oil sector's first-ever globally applicable agreement on industrial relations. This covers basic trade union rights, health, safety and the environment, information and training. In March 2001, an updated and further strengthened version of the agreement was concluded. This new agreement takes full account of the UN's Global Compact initiative, under which multinationals commit themselves to promote trade union rights and other human rights.

Norway&#039;s Oil Union Faces Court Over Solidarity for Trico Workers

Imerys, the ceramics, minerals and construction materials multinational, must recognise the trade union rights of its American workers without further delay. 
 
That was the message from Fred Higgs when he addressed cheering Imerys workers at a rally in Sylacauga, Alabama, on Saturday. 
 
Higgs is General Secretary of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), which has been campaigning against the anti-union stance adopted by Imerys at its US sites. The US Imerys workers' union, PACE, is an ICEM affiliate. 
 
PACE and the ICEM will &quot;make it so hot for Imerys that they will be looking for a solution,&quot; Higgs promised more than 250 workers attending the rally. They responded by taunting Imerys with chants of &quot;ICEM&quot; and &quot;PACE Will Be In Your Face&quot;. 
 
The restructuring that led to the formation of Imerys last year included the merger of unionised and non-unionised production plants in the USA. PACE now wants the chance to represent workers throughout the newly merged Imerys operation there, but the company has hired professional &quot;union-busters&quot; to discourage union organising and is blocking all attempts to let its workers decide if they want to be represented by the union. 
 
Imerys is based in France, where unions are backing the American workers' campaign. Support is also coming from unions in England, where Imerys has major production sites and Belgium, where financiers the Frere family hold a substantial interest in Imerys. 
 
In Europe, Imerys recognises trade unions and has taken a &quot;social partnership&quot; approach to industrial relations. Higgs has dubbed Imerys a &quot;chameleon corporation,&quot; accusing it of trying in America what it would not dare to attempt in Europe. 
 
Company tactics in the US so far have included compulsory meetings at which workers are shown videos that equate trade unions with the mafia. At Saturday's rally, Higgs told the American workers that Imerys was using in the States industrial relations methods that would be illegal in Europe. 
 
Higgs also noted the abrupt departure last week of Dennis Rediker. Prior to the sale of English China Clays to Imerys forerunner Imetal, ECC was run by Rediker, who was its chief executive officer and major shareholder. After Imetal acquired ECC, Rediker was made a Vice-President of Imerys-owned Georgia Marble and was put in charge of its Pigment Division. 
 
Rediker has a long history of anti-unionism and PACE believes that he was the main reason why Imerys' attitude to trade unions in America has clashed so markedly with its policies in Europe. 

Little is known about the circumstances of Rediker's sudden departure, but he is understood to have been replaced by Imerys executives from France. 
 
&quot;The fact that Rediker has moved on just now is not coincidental,&quot; Higgs said. &quot;It is symptomatic of the ideological rift between the US management and the centre.&quot; 
 
Speakers at Saturday's rally included Don Langham, PACE Vice-President and ICEM Executive member; Stuart Burkhalter, President of the Alabama State branch of the US labour federation AFL-CIO; Jimmy Colston, the PACE officer who organised the Georgia Marble plant 29 years ago (the Sylacauga plant at which Imerys has withdrawn recognition of the union); and ICEM North American Regional Coordinator Ken Zinn. 
 
All emphasised the need to rid Imerys' American operations of anti-unionism. 
 
A strange little incident shows just how urgent that task has become. 
 
Prior to Saturday's event, management told a number of union members that if they brought in food from the rally, they would be fired. 
 
So Imerys American management is even frightened of union-bought snacks. 
 
Food for thought in Paris.

Higgs Vows at US Rally: &#039;We&#039;ll Make it Hot for Imerys!&#039;

A 4.2 percent wage increase over two years has been secured for 580,000 chemical workers and 50,000 paper workers in western Germany under collective agreements concluded this week. 
 
In both cases, pay will go up by 2.2 percent this year and 2 percent in 2001. The precise dates of application vary by region and by sector. 
 
The agreements for both industries also emphasise job creation measures, notably a further increase in apprenticeships for young job-seekers. Retirement provisions for older workers are improved, as are the possibilities for taking early retirement on what in many cases adds up to almost the same net income as for those in work. 
 
The agreements have been negotiated by the mining, chemical and energy workers' union IG BCE, which at the global level is affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). 
 
By and large, German collective agreements cover all employees within a given industry, regardless of their trade and their job category. In the chemical sector, this principle has come under pressure in recent years due to the current managerial fashion for hiving off activities considered &quot;non-core&quot;. German chemical firms' logistics and staff canteens have been particularly subject to this trend. 
 
IG BCE is keen to uphold the principle that all employees within the chemical industry are covered by the union's agreements and the union's protection. In cases such as logistics and canteens, it has therefore agreed to devolve more bargaining to the enterprise or workplace level. 
 
German collective agreements are negotiated regionally industry-by-industry, but with leeway for some variations at the enterprise level. In practice, the same main conditions are usually agreed for all western German states within a given sector. Eastern German states have separate bargaining arrangements. Their pay and conditions are gradually being brought up to the level of those in the western part of the country.

German Paper, Chemical Workers Win Pay Raises

Unions organising General Electric workers in 20 countries met in Washington today to coordinate their monitoring of GE's worldwide employment practices and to make the company respect trade union rights. 
 
Organised by the International Metalworkers' Federation (IMF), the conference has been emphasising worker unity both across frontiers and across sectors. At the IMF's request, the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM) has also mobilised its affiliated unions to take part in the Washington event. GE, like many multinationals, now has operations that cross the sectoral boundaries between the different global industrial trade union federations. It has expanded beyond its traditional metals base into chemicals and plastics. 
 
The GE world council, which is part of the IMF, will monitor GE and share information, the conference decided. The unions are seeking GE's compliance with the IMF Code of Principles. In this, they will be greatly assisted by rapid information exchanges via the IMF's comprehensive GE database. 
 
The unions said they would develop trade union strategies to counter GE activities that are detrimental to many workers' economic and social interests. Over the past few years, they emphasised, GE has &quot;ruthlessly turned its back on thousands of workers throughout the world by laying them off and by exploiting them in countries where internationally recognised labour standards are neither recognised nor enforced.&quot; 

They also noted that GE's &quot;yearly revenue exceeds the gross national product of 130 nations&quot; and that the number of GE workers outside the US has doubled in four years, from 62,000 to 143,000. Altogether, GE has about 340,000 employees. So, as the Washington delegates pointed out, the company's net profits of US$10.7 billion last year represent $30,000 of profit from the work of each and every employee. 
 
&quot;Solidarity and close communication are essential if GE unions are to meet the challenge of GE's globalisation strategy,&quot; said IMF General Secretary Marcello Malentacchi. He noted that the origins of the IMF-GE World Council date from 1966 and said the present conference is being held in the United States &quot;with a view to supporting our US colleagues in their negotiations&quot; with GE. US unions' next bargaining round with GE starts at the end of May. 
 
Malentacchi and John Sweeney, President of the US national labour federation AFL-CIO, opened the two-day conference. Delegates also heard an overview of US bargaining from Edward Fire, chairman of the Coordinated Bargaining Committee of GE Unions (CBC). The CBC bargains on behalf of 40,000 workers in 14 US unions. Fire is President of the International Union of Electronic, Electrical, Salaried, Machine &amp; Furniture Workers (IUE), which is affiliated both to the IMF and to the ICEM. 
 
ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs paid tribute to the leadership of the IMF and Marcello Malentacchi in building international trade union solidarity at GE. 
 
Higgs is taking part in the Washington conference, together with ICEM President John Maitland and ICEM North American Regional Coordinator Ken Zinn. 
 
&quot;For the ten-year period 1990 to 1999,&quot; Higgs told delegates, &quot;global operating profits in GE's plastics and chemicals division increased by about 75% ... The division's operating profits of $1.65 billion last year came to 14.8% of total company operating profits, and the division's revenues of $6.9 billion came to 6.2% of total company revenues. So, while this is a minority part of GE's overall business, plastics and chemicals seem to be a growing and significant part of the company's bottom line.&quot; 
 
The implications for the IMF, the ICEM and their affiliated unions worldwide were obvious, Higgs said: &quot;Our federations and our individual affiliates should cooperate as closely as possible, support each other and use our unique strengths to build the kind of trade union power necessary to take on a company such as this.&quot;

General Electric Workers Pledge Unity

Ukraine's worst mining disaster is now being investigated by a team led by Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko. The probe commission includes Mikhail Volynets, President of the Miners' Independent Trade Union of Ukraine (MITU). 
 
Saturday's explosion at the Barakova mine killed 80 workers and injured seven others, Volynets confirms in a fax received today by the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM). MITU is an ICEM affiliate. 
 
Describing the accident as &quot;the most serious in recent years&quot;, Volynets says the blast happened &quot;during repair work&quot; at the mine and was caused by a &quot;mixture of dust and gas&quot;. Barakova is owned by the state holding company Krasnodonugol. As well as investigating the accident, the government team of which Volynets is part is bringing &quot;vital assistance to the families of those killed and injured&quot;. 
 
Ukraine has one of the world's highest mining accident rates. Close to 1,500 Ukrainian miners have been killed over the past five years. MITU, backed by the ICEM, has been campaigning to reverse a catastrophic spiral of underinvestment, leading to falls in productivity, leading to further cutbacks in equipment and safety. Non-payment of miners' wages has been another serious problem in the cash-starved industry.&nbsp; 
 
&quot;Beyond sadness and grief, drastic measures need to be taken to address the causes of these series of mine disasters,&quot; insists ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs in a message of condolence to the MITU. In particular, Higgs calls for implementation by Ukraine of Convention 176 on mining safety, adopted by the UN's International Labour Organisation (ILO). 
 
Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma has declared 13 and 14 March as days of national mourning for those killed in the Barakova disaster.

Ukrainian Miners&#039; President Joins Disaster Probe Team

The Rio Tinto Shareholder Coalition, backed by worker-owners and trade unions in Australia, Europe and the United States, today launched an unprecedented global shareholder proxy contest with one of the world&rsquo;s largest mining companies, Rio Tinto. This is the first-ever joint shareholder initiative sponsored by unions in several countries and, in recognition of the growing globalisation of the capital markets, represents the broadest international proxy contest to date by any shareholder proponent. 
 
The shareholder coalition today submitted two resolutions for consideration by the shareholders at both London-based Rio Tinto plc and Melbourne-based Rio Tinto Ltd. during the company&rsquo;s two Annual General Meetings in the United Kingdom and Australia in May. The resolutions demand that the Rio Tinto board of directors become more accountable to its shareholders through the appointment of an independent, non-executive Deputy Chairman after May 2000, and that the company implement a workplace code of labour practice at its operations worldwide. The coalition is asking institutional investors to support these two resolutions in order to make Rio Tinto more accountable to its shareholders and increase shareholder value. The coalition also launched today a special website dedicated to the proxy contest, with the complete text of the resolutions and supporting statements. 
 
The Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU) - the principal union representing Rio Tinto&rsquo;s unionised workforce in Australia - has joined with the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU), the Trades Union Congress (TUC) of Great Britain, the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), and the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers&rsquo; Unions (ICEM) in a worldwide public launch of the shareholder initiative today in Sydney, Brussels, London and Washington, D.C. Combined, these organisations represent 41 million workers. 
 
The proponents represent workers who are direct Rio Tinto shareholders and who are also beneficiaries of pension funds which are company shareholders. The coalition estimates that pension funds with worker beneficiaries account for approximately 19 per cent of Rio Tinto&rsquo;s shares - worth approximately 3.2 billion dollars - mainly held through nominee accounts. 
 
&quot;Our members have both capital equity and sweat equity invested in Rio Tinto,&quot; said John Maitland, who is both National Secretary of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union of Australia and President of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers&rsquo; Unions (ICEM). Unions affiliated to the ICEM also represent Rio Tinto employees in the United States, Canada, South Africa, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Austria, Norway, France, the United Kingdom and Chile. &quot;They have a long-term interest in the success of the company and know that Rio Tinto&rsquo;s success is impossible without respect for their rights in the workplace,&quot; Maitland pointed out. 
 
&quot;These resolutions are about good corporate governance, and we hope that as such they will receive the full support of the Rio Tinto shareholders,&quot; commented ICEM General Secretary Fred Higgs. &quot;The worldwide code of labour practice is urgently needed within Rio Tinto, but it must be credible and verifiable. The only way to ensure that such a code is properly implemented is to make it part of a global agreement between Rio Tinto and the ICEM. We are ready and willing to reach an agreement with Rio Tinto.&quot; 
 
&quot;We are challenging Rio Tinto management to become more accountable as well as to minimise its risk exposure to serious human rights violations,&quot; said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. &quot;We will be actively encouraging pension fund trustees, money managers and other institutional investors to support these resolutions,&quot; he said. 
 
&quot;These resolutions make sound economic and business sense,&quot; said John Monks, General Secretary of the 7-million-member British Trades Union Congress. &quot;Companies with high standards of corporate governance who value their workforce are the companies that succeed and give shareholders and pension fund members a better return on their investments. These are the companies that succeed in the long term.&quot; 
 
Speaking at the Australian launch in Sydney today, Greg Combet, Secretary of the Australian Council of Trade Unions, stated that the shareholder action was the first of its kind for trade unions in Australia, and the first-ever joint shareholder action by worker-owners from a number of countries at a multinational company. &quot;Worker-owners and other shareholders need to join together in common cause to ensure that corporate management is accountable and that the long-term interests of shareholders and workers are protected,&quot; said Combet. 
 
Joining Combet at the Sydney press conference was Susan Ryan, former Australian federal government minister and current adviser to the Australian Institute of Superannuation Trustees. Ryan will be conducting the shareholder solicitation in Australia in support of these resolutions. &quot;Good corporate governance and respect for workers&rsquo; rights in the workplace are good for shareholders, workers and communities,&quot; she said. &quot;It&rsquo;s a win-win situation for all concerned and it&rsquo;s the high road way to compete in the 21st Century.&quot;

Rio Tinto Shareholder Coalition Backs Better Corporate Governance

The new Austrian government's policies were sharply criticised yesterday by the country's mining, metal and energy union the GMBE. In the same statement, the union condemned the climate of intolerance created by one of the coalition partners, Joerg Haider's extreme right-wing Freedom Party of Austria (FPOe). 
 
The government's programme will, the GMBE says, place &quot;massive, unilateral burdens on workers, and particularly on women workers, but also on young people, the unemployed, the sick and the pensioners.&quot; It particularly criticises plans to raise the legal pension age and cut the incomes of those who retire earlier. And, as the union points out, the government intends to scrap previously successful employment programmes in order to finance big hand-outs to companies and farmers. The government programme also fails to bring in &quot;reforms that are important for the workers - notably the protection of workers within a globalised economy and real improvements in training and retraining.&quot; 
 
On the FPOe's role in the new government, the GMBE says &quot;the concerns of the European Union and other states are quite understandable&quot;. In particular, the union cites Haider's praise for what he called the &quot;proper employment policies of the Third Reich&quot; and his description of former SS officers as &quot;decent people&quot;. [For more on Haider's sayings, the union recommends the Austrian Haiderwatch website - available in both German and English]. 
 
But, the GMBE insists, &quot;we reject any blanket condemnation of the Austrians as a 'Nazi people'. After all, more than 70 percent of the electors did not vote for the FPOe.&quot; The union warns that boycotts of Austrian goods, services and tourism would &quot;hit the wrong people, namely the workers.&quot; 
 
The FPOe has repeatedly &quot;stirred up fear, intolerance and xenophobia,&quot; the GMBE says. It accuses the party of &quot;playing different parts of the population off against each other.&quot; 
 
The GMBE &quot;judges any government - of whatever party - on the basis of what it does for the workers in this country. We will act massively against the measures of the new federal government, which are worsening the situation of working, unemployed and retired people in Austria. At the same time, we oppose the brutalisation of Austria's political culture.&quot; 
 
At the global level, the GMBE is affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM).

Austrian Union Slams New Government

Pay rises are combined with job creation measures in the new collective agreement for Germany's 30,000 rubber industry workers. 
 
This is the first sectoral agreement reached this year by the IG BCE union, which covers a wide range of process, chemical, mining and energy industries. The rubber sector deal is a &quot;first benchmark for the 2000 bargaining round,&quot; emphasised Werner Bischoff, IG BCE's head of collective bargaining. 
 
Employment-boosting measures are an important part of the new agreement, in line with the current &quot;Alliance For Jobs&quot; between unions, employers and Germany's social democrat/environmentalist federal government. 
 
For example, improvements to early retirement provisions will mean that rubber workers aged 55 and above can opt to work half-time while continuing to be paid at least 85 percent of their last full-time net wage. For workers on a three-shift roster, the corresponding figure will be 95 percent. 
 
At the same time, a new employment promotion fund to be administered jointly by the employers and the union will help to finance early retirement by rubber workers. Payments from the fund will virtually eliminate the net financial difference between retirement at age 60 and retirement at the legal age of 65. 
 
&quot;We have lived up to our responsibilities and made our contribution to the success of the Alliance for Jobs,&quot; Bischoff said. 
 
On wages, the agreement provides an overall increase of 2.9 percent in Western Germany, effective from 1 October this year until at least 31 October 2001. Workers will pay 0.4 percent of the increase into the employment promotion fund. In Eastern Germany, the increase will be 3.2 percent, effective from 1 March 2001 for one year. Here too, 0.4 percent of the pay rise will go into the employment promotion fund. 
 
At the global level, IG BCE is affiliated to the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM).

German Rubber Industry Deal Boosts Jobs And Pay

A row is brewing between two Geneva-based international agencies over who is to codify worldwide occupational health and safety management norms. 
 
Workers' right to a global say on workplace health and safety could be under threat if the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) next month votes itself competent to tackle this complex issue. 
 
Any ISO efforts on this would cut across work already well under way within the UN's International Labour Organisation (ILO). And the ISO, unlike the ILO, excludes organised labour. 
 
The ILO sets ratifiable and binding international standards on a wide range of labour-related matters. Worker, employer and government representatives from all over the world meet on equal terms within this &quot;tripartite&quot; UN agency. All three groups draw up and adopt the ILO's standards, and all three monitor national governments' compliance with them once they are in force. 
 
Occupational health and safety is a major focus of these ILO norms, and organised labour has been one of the main driving forces behind the adoption and application of the standards. 
 
No such labour representation exists within the ISO, where strong corporate influence is brought to bear. The ISO is known mainly for two &quot;families&quot; of standards - ISO 9000 on quality management and ISO 14000 on environmental management. Through worldwide standardisation, ISO helps to speed the globalisation process by reducing &quot;technical barriers to trade&quot;. 
 
Any ISO move into the health and safety field would also be market-driven. In fact, the voting proposal now before the ISO's national member organisations argues that it &quot;will enable a faster response to market needs than could be met through the development of a standard in partnership with the ILO ...&quot; 
 
The proposal comes from influential ISO member the British Standards Institute. BSI wants to set up an ISO technical committee on occupational health and safety management systems, with the aim of &quot;developing a non-certifiable ISO standard based on [existing UK standard] BS 8800:1996&quot;. The ISO's national member organisations have until 10 March to vote on the British motion. 
 
BSI, meanwhile, got the industrialists on board by issuing a joint communique on 21 January with the multinational companies' Industry Cooperation on Standards and Conformity Assessment (ICSCA). &quot;ILO, due to its scope and membership, is not an appropriate organisation to publish an international standard on occupational health and safety management systems,&quot; BSI and ICSCA jointly opined. &quot;Instead, ILO is encouraged to participate actively in work in this area, through its liaison with ISO ...&quot; 
 
If it gets the green light from its members, this will be the ISO's second attempt to wrest the health and safety brief from the ILO. 
 
At the beginning of 1997, the ISO decided to discontinue its previous efforts to to draw up occupational health and safety management system standards. This followed an ISO seminar which found that the ILO, precisely because of its tripartite structure, was the more appropriate forum. 
 
Subsequently, the ILO drafted non-mandatory guidelines on occupational health and safety management systems, drawing on a detailed review of standards and codes of practice worldwide. These guidelines are due to be tested this year. 
 
&quot;The ILO is the proper forum for these efforts,&quot; declared Fred Higgs in Brussels today. Higgs is the General Secretary of the 20-million-strong International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers' Unions (ICEM), which has helped shape a number of major ILO health and safety initiatives. 
 
&quot;We call upon ICEM member unions, and all others who believe that workers are entitled to a say on occupational health and safety management, to press their national ISO member organisations for a 'no' vote on this motion,&quot; Higgs said. 
 
&quot;Global health and safety management standards in the workplace are not the sole prerogative of the big corporations,&quot; Higgs insisted. &quot;Organised labour must have a full say on this vital standard-setting activity. When workplace health and safety are at stake, workers are experts.&quot;

World Health And Safety Norms: ILO or ISO

Archive

South African Mining Settlement

Norway's Oil Union Faces Court Over Solidarity for Trico Workers

Higgs Vows at US Rally: 'We'll Make it Hot for Imerys!'

German Paper, Chemical Workers Win Pay Raises

General Electric Workers Pledge Unity

Ukrainian Miners' President Joins Disaster Probe Team

Rio Tinto Shareholder Coalition Backs Better Corporate Governance

Austrian Union Slams New Government

German Rubber Industry Deal Boosts Jobs And Pay

World Health And Safety Norms: ILO or ISO

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