A follow up visit to several departments of the Georgetown Mayor and City Council has found some corrections to the many breaches unearthed.
“It is a work in progress and they are getting there,” says a Labour, Occupational Safety and Health Officer at the Ministry of Social Protection’s Department of Labour, who did not want to be named.
The officer said that the main issue affecting the council is the lack of financial resources, however it is trying to remedy the defects.
A report on the inspections, done by Labour, Occupational Safety and Health Officers Roydon Croal and Latoya John and which was handed over to Town Clerk Royston King on July 1, said the Ministry was acting on complaints that were highlighted at the Solid Waste Department, Municipal Stores, Municipal Abattoir and Concert Hall of the Mayor and City Council (M&CC).
In their initial visit, officers had reported that there were deteriorated buildings and a lack of a safety and health policy, among other issues.
The objectives of the inspections were to, among other things, encourage the adoption of best practices and to share ideas for improvement, to reduce the possible number of workplace accidents and fatalities and to highlight the concerns of workers to ensure that their rights were not trampled upon.
The report further said that the conditions seen “somewhat pose a detriment to a safe working environment and serious threat to life and limb,” and it therefore outlined several recommendations for urgent attention by management. It was expected that the breaches identified would be corrected on or before July 29.
In relation to the abattoir, the report said that urgent repairs needed to be effected and no safety and health policy was in place. A similar situation was found at the Solid Waste Department.
The official said that the abattoir has since resuscitated its joint occupational and health safety committee and the Solid Waste Department has put a safety health policy in place based on the report, which called on the M&CC to cause a “joint workplace safety and health committee to be established and maintained at the workplace.”
The report had also found that not only was the concert hall at City Hall found to be in a deplorable state, it was also stated that employees’ health was at risk due to the diseases associated with pigeons. “An assessment should be done before entering the building. The pigeon is a health hazard and would pose a challenge for them to work under those conditions,” it said.
It was also found that while the hall was not in use by the public for the past ten years, it was neither maintained nor repaired. “Management recognises that the upper flat of the concert hall had deteriorated over the years,” the report added.
“They would have cleaned and they would have taken a private contractor and he would have cleaned the whole concert hall. The EU (European Union) would have sent out tenders for the concert hall but they need contractors to assess the building first,” the officer said in relation to the concert hall.
