[Greens-Media] Safety slips in building and construction laws

[Twomey, Chris (Sen R. Siewert)]

Friday 14th  September 2007

Safety slips in building and construction laws

"Changes made yesterday to the Building and Construction Industry
Improvement Act will do little to improve the manner in which these
unfair laws undermine the health and safety on our worksites," said
Senator Rachel Siewert today.

"We are in danger of slipping back to the bad old days on construction
sites in the seventies - when you had seventeen year old workers falling
off buildings on their first day on the job," she said.

Senator Siewert restated the Greens steadfast opposition to the Building
and Construction Industry Improvement Act and the ABCC in a speech
yesterday on amendment to that Act.

"Due to this Act, ordinary Australian workers have no right of silence,
limited access to bona fide legal representation and a threat of six
months jail for being involved in or possibly having knowledge of
industrial actions that were not illegal at the time that they were said
to have occurred, " said Senator Siewert.

"The workers caught up by these laws are being denied basic democratic
rights to procedural fairness and natural justice that all of us
normally take for granted."

"It is an act which we believe has seriously undermined the health and
safety gains made in recent decades for workers within the building and
construction sector."
	           
For more information or comment call 
Chris Twomey on 0407 725 025

Email senator.siewert at aph.gov.au
http://www.rachelsiewert.org.au

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Senator Rachel Siewert
Australian Greens Senator for Western Australia