Speakers:
Taesun Kang, Professor, Department of Health and Safety Engineering, Semyung University
Hyunchul Ryu, Director, Korea Institute of Labor Safety and Health
Jin-Woo Jung, Professor, Department of Safety Engineering, Seoul National University of Science & Technology
Moderator:
Min Choi, Korea Institute of Labor Safety and Health
Thursday, July 2, 2020 at 2:00 pm, Korea Institute of Labor Safety and Health Office
The validity of prioritization and focus strategies
Choi: Starting from the year of 2018, the Ministry of Labor and the Korea Safety and Health Agency (KOSHA) focused on death from occupational accidents related to the construction industry and falls at the worksite excluding overall. How do you evaluate this policy direction?
Jung: It seems that the present government emphasized more on reducing fatal accidents. I basically agree with the policy direction. However, since we only focused on preventing serious accidents, there are some blindsights occurring in the field. In order to prevent fatal accidents, the system must be strengthened as well as conditions and capabilities within the system. We tend to miss important content within the safety protocol as evidenced by poor quality in safety training programs. It is unfortunate that public institutions were not able to find the need to develop protocols. In order to improve the safety and health level and management capability of the workplace, it is necessary to increase safety sensitivity, safety awareness, and safety concerns. I am concerned that providing essential training and system maintenance are neglected compared to the past.
There may be consequences related to neglection of essential training and system maintenance in the long run. The problem is that they go all-in only for accidental accidents. When we think of Heinrich’s law, shouldn’t we pay more attention to near-misses in the field? Although a major disaster may occur without a minor accident, we need to learn from our lessons and should be more prepared for the preventable accidents. That’s why you can’t see them now. To sum up, I wonder if there is an unbalance of the system.
Kang: I don’t know all the details of the policy, but if I could evaluate it even at a limited level, I think the government is doing well. The reason is that the government has not been able to do so as they lack strategies. Korea has a long history of occupational safety and health (OSH) policy. The problem was that the purpose of OSH was to prepare for the National Audit or the Ministry of Labor’s own audit. I think the people who work in the OSH field in Korea have thought that industrial accidents cannot be prevented. Defeatism has been endemic in the society. So, I think they stayed within a policy that is not to be blamed. Considering this, it is highly appreciated that the government set the policy goal of reducing fatal accidents by half. It required concentration and abandonment.
They sort out the falls in the construction area. And, of course, you can be blamed for excluding some areas. But we have never tried prioritizing on the topics, so it was a try. Of course, there are many complaints from the abandoned side. For example, a person who has been in health-related jobs may have to go to a construction site that he has never been to. However, it was necessary in the field of OSH, which was never properly selected and focused in the past. Fatal accidents and serious disaster prevention activities are all about evaluating and reducing risks. A good strategy is needed to focus on what has been proven to be effective. On-site inspection focusing on ladders and scaffolding, and expanding the system scaffolding market. It is expected that the safety and health practices of the construction industry will change a lot. Of course, the outcome takes time which will take about three years from now. Besides the mortality rate, it is necessary to develop more indicators to use as an evaluation standard. In order to do that, they have to open and release various data and as there is not enough data, it can be difficult to evaluate.
Ryu: It takes time for Human and financial resources to be increased. So selection and focus are required on specific agendas and phases. However, I would like to ask whether the decision-making process and the method of concentration that made the choice were appropriate. Strong leadership will give you the power to realize your policy, but depending on the judgment of some people who have decision-making power, your focus may change easily. Also, rather than evaluating the effect of the policy thoroughly, I think they were paying too much attention to a single indicator reduction. I think we should have looked more closely at the policy implementation process and its effectiveness, and considered the opinions of various stakeholders. Of course, there have been few policies that have been clearly established and enforced, so I think that they may have paid attention only to reporting policy outcomes. I would like to be able to do more detailed evaluations in the future and keep the forum open for discussion. From prioritizing to evaluating and reporting the effectiveness, there are concerns that they may have fallen into the errors of circular logic or self-centered thinking. So we need to look back to see if it would be desirable to continue in this direction.
Jung: I want to summarize that they were motivated but lacking at skills. And if you don’t have the skills, I think you should have gathered opinions at least. But it feels like it has shrunk rather than before. The ladder policy is typical. It is difficult to revise the legislation in a short period of time, so a guideline was released first. But this time, the Industrial Safety and Health Act was revised, but the items related to ladders were not revised. It is not logical. Since professionalism is not supported, it may be an administration without plan. The same thing happened with the ‘contract work’. They may have failed to get opinions from inside and outside, or to coordinate opinions between the Ministry of Labor and the KOSHA. Therefore, I think the policy establishment and enforcement would be rough. Policy is not subject to testing. Even if it is not perfect, it is the policy officer’s attitude to establish and enforce the quality of the policy as much as possible.
Building a system is paramount
Choi: The decision-making process is important, but the effectiveness of the chosen policy will also be important. Although the system scaffolding has been proven to prevent the fall, how will policies such as patrol operation and expansion of the system scaffolding market affect the prevention of the fall and increase the safety level of construction sites in the future?
Kang: Actually, it’s like seeking hot water under cold ice. To verify the validity of the procedure or method, we need to have more data to analyze. You only have the statistics of the dead and injured. However, since the situation is so serious, it is necessary to set the policy, and it is not easy to prepare an accurate countermeasure with the current statistics. That’s why the government ends up copying the policy of foreign countries. Although the legal system can be known, the policy implementation strategy is implicit, so it cannot be known. Patrol activity would probably have performed as presumed. The guidelines for ‘ladder’ or ‘contract work’ leave something to be desired, if you look closely. The communication with KOSHA or the field was not good, and there were many shortcomings in terms of effectiveness. After all, deciding which strategy to use and where to seek consent seem to fall within the scope of policy planning and enforcement. Maybe it is a transition period for system maintenance. It is a process of trying out various policies with unorganized data and systems.
Ryu: I want to approach it from the other side. It’s important to be good at tactics, and it’s also important to try and fix it. But wouldn’t it be a good place to look at how far it would affect policies? I mean the possibility of impact on workers in the real world. It was not necessary to be highly specialized to prevent the recent crush accidents, suffocation disasters, and fall accidents. If it’s not available to fully manage all workplaces, shouldn’t we be able to spread the effect of policy to the workers? Not just safety education programs or public information. For example, allowing the workers to opt out of the risks if they face. Guaranteeing authority to organizations that can speak when individuals are in trouble. Shouldn’t we consider the participation of workers and labor organizations? Although it lacks professionalism compared to the Ministry of Labor and Safety and KOSHA, I think it is necessary to diversify safety and health actors to create comprehensive safety and health related activities. In particular, efforts to guarantee and realize workers’ rights will be important. Like establishing a council between governance, interagency, and stakeholders that encompasses safety and health-related actors. If we neglect this, the direction of policy in the future will also be narrowed.
Jung: In terms of the subject of OSH activities, we need autonomous safety and health activities at the workplace level. Safety and health administrative competency and autonomous safety and health management are the two pillars. Not only the former, but the latter is also lacking. It is undesirable for the administration to rush to short-term results. Even if the supervision of the administrative agency is not carried out directly, the key is to ensure that the autonomous regulation, which is the basis of safety and health activities, can actually be operated. This requires significant effort. It’s taking a long time and it’s difficult, so I’m afraid they might be letting go. For example, rebuilding the worker participation system. In the absence of labor unions, especially in small businesses, this needs to be guaranteed by workers’ representatives. The law requires that workers’ representatives be elected, but the selection procedure and activities are not specified. It is difficult for self-regulation to work without a provision of a systematic system that fosters workers participation. Apart from the size of the company, autonomous activities can complement a lot, but I don’t think there is any effort to provide such an institutional mechanism. In that sense, there seems to be no sincerity as well as professionalism.
How can autonomous OSH management be possible?
Choi: The workers’ participation system and autonomous safety inspection seem oddly overlapping and deviating at the same time. The question is how to understand and use autonomous safety inspection. In Korea, I think that companies use autonomous safety inspections as a means of avoiding regulations or liability. Isn’t it because autonomous safety checks aren’t working in the field because the company’s interests are prioritized rather than the government’s poor understanding of policies?
Jung: Autonomous safety inspection was a concept raised in the Robens Report. It starts with the perception that there are limitations only by laws and regulations, and it is difficult to cover the entire workplace safety and health only by the government’s supervision. It was a means to supplement the legal system. It’s not that they ask to leave the inspection to the field due to difficulty of obeying the law. However, the concept of self-regulation is also missing from the purpose of the Occupational Safety and Health Act. Isn’t this a testament to the fact that the government also considered this unnecessary? To fill the administrative shortcomings, we cannot talk about self-regulatory safety regulations not mentioning the participation of workers. It is one of the subjects who know the field the most.
Kang: I agree 100%. When an OSHA representative visited Korea he said that only employers can make safe workplace. There are more than 3 million workplaces in Korea. It is impossible to supervise all workplaces. You cannot rely only on the ethics of your employers. In the end, a strategy must be established to maximize the effectiveness of management supervision. Employers need to be alert, and in particular they need to be aware that it is easy to implement safety and health regulation. There may be trial and error during implementation of the law. The process of guiding it must also be involved. The supervisory ability to exert a restraining effect is important, and labor inspectors must be able to exercise discretionary power. Proper discretion is, after all, a specialty. Management supervision and guidance for workplace improvement are difficult to regulate by law. A certain process and human capacity are needed. Can self-regulation and deterrent effects be realized under current Korean conditions?
Ryu: Both professionalism and fairness are needed in relation to the discretion of the labor inspector. In Korea, however, there are many cases where ‘stop work’ order is avoided because of production disruption or small workplace. I suspect that the company’s interests were considered first. I can’t help but ask what specialty we want the supervisor to have based on. Considering that workers and labor unions are actively requesting to stop work to prevent accidents and improve working conditions, and the process of reluctantly accepting them is repeated, we need to check when and how inspectors’ discretion is exercised currently.
Kang: Actually, it’s no different from having no discretion right now. It is also the government’s fault that they have failed to encourage employers to protect workers. I think we can pay attention to some point of patrol operation. For small workplaces, at least 30 to 40 per inspector a year should be inspected. It ends up with just a formal supervision. Clever employers, so-called vicious employers, do not get caught up in the regulatory network. The perception has been widespread that obedient employers who don’t know what’s going on are dragged around. Government has run the patrol intensively this time. In the field, it is said,’We have finally been supervised, and the government is coming to place even like this.’ ; ‘However, when I was inspected, it was mainly focused on the fall, so I couldn’t bear the burden.’;’If the safety measures related to the fall were good, it would not be difficult to be supervised.’ etc. Now I think employers have come to realize that they need to do something and it’s not so hard to do it. In this way, it seems that the momentum for the establishing will of the employers can be served.
Ryu: I think it is important to prepare conditions for the employers to make a safer workplace. Safety costs money. In the end, it’s not just the willingness to implement safety measures, but the ability to afford it. In small businesses, the cost is actually burdensome. Shouldn’t we build a system that can endure this? I doubt the way we lean on the goodwill of employers.
Jung: One policy is not enough. It may end up with a one-time thing. OSH systems can not be built by the way of pointing out first and then scolding if not improved. Autonomous safety and health management cannot be settled properly until the basic infrastructure is established and this centralized policy is activated. Furthermore, the competency of management supervision and workplace can be accumulated. We need to check whether we have a sustainable policy and a long-term outlook.
Tasks for strengthening safety and health capabilities
Choi: From the viewpoint of labor unions and NGO, the Ministry of Labor and the KOSHA often seem to represent only the interests of the employers. As in the mortality case of the Hyundai Steel accident, something happened that did not take proper judgment and action. From the administrative perspective, what needs to be improved to ensure that the on-site labor inspectors keep their balances in the labor-management relations? Wouldn’t it be more workforce and budget? And what do you think about the establishment of the Safety and Health Administration or the expansion of investigation authority?
Kang: Recently, the manpower and budget are increasing. It is necessary to increase the number of local labor inspectors for on-site inspection, but I think the most urgent thing is to increase the manpower of headquarters. If on-site inspection and accident response is secondary expertise, how to ensure autonomous safety management is achieved is the primary expertise. In addition to the technical approach, a workforce that can take a strategic approach is important. We need to expand the headquarter policy groups.
Jung: I agree. However, compared to foreign countries, it is difficult to say that there is a shortage of manpower. If expanded, the professionalizing workforce should be premised. Reform is needed in relation to HR issues such as recruitment, career management, and training. How can a person who has only prepared for the exam and has no field experience can properly establish a policy? A careful HR policy is needed to accumulate on-site experience and melt it into policy.
Kang: For that, people in charge also need incentives. Few people think they will become OSH experts. What can you expect from such an organization? We need to create a part where we can oversee the work of individual departments, analyse performance, and make policy. We should provide opportunities to build competency and motivation to allocate OSH personnel there. Even if the number of manpower is relatively similar with foreign countries, you should also look at the level of authority. It must be an organization that can demonstrate sufficient policy leadership. You need to consider alternatives such as the Health and Safety Administration. However, organizational restructuring is a long-term task and needs a phased implementation strategy.
Ryu: Structural problems also need to be addressed. The ‘outsourcing of risks’ raised in the struggles of the late Kim Yong-gyun and Guui Station accident can be a key issue in safety and health. How should health and safety administration respond?
Kang: In order to respond to structural problems, we need to properly conduct an accident investigation. Accident investigations can cover a wide range of technical and structural causes. It is necessary to institutionalize it as an investigation to prevent recurrence rather than just for punishment. Technically and legally, we should reveal fundamental factors to be improved as well as we find violations. Through the investigation report, we must have a process where the finding of investigation is officially reflected in the law and work environment is improved. It’s a problem to just blame insensitivity to safety for everything, but there’s also a long leap that everything is due to outsourcing. Proper accident investigation needs to be repeated and accumulated. Furthermore, various alternatives should be suggested from various angles by releasing relevant data. I would like the KOSHA or the Ministry of Labor to pay more attention to accident investigation.
Ryu: In the case of multi-level subcontractors and non-standard contracted employees in the construction industry, it is necessary to change not only technical OSH issues, but also employment types and industrial structures in a preventive way. Why is the government not trying to actively interpret and apply the legal system in this situation?
Jung: The role is divided between government ministries, and I think it is because they are not trying to cooperate closely with each other in solving problems. For example, in the case of an accident due to illegal dispatch, it may happen that the departments related to safety and health are not interested and do nothing about illegal dispatch, saying it’s outside their jurisdiction. are related to other departments. If you put in a provision related to non-standard contracted employees in the Occupational Safety and Health Act, they could think more carefully, but I think there was no effort to establish a clear criteria for defining whether or not one is a non-standard contract employee. The construction site safety monitoring team can be also outsourced. It is also a problem to allow it as a safety manager under the OSH Act. The safety manager must be hired by a main contractor. Gaps between specialty and authority cannot be avoided. In this way, I think that the Ministry of Labor and the KOSHA are no better than neglecting their duties by separating work from each other and shifting responsibility to others. A government-wide close connection and safety and health management system should be created.
Kang: In that regard, I hope that they will continue to make efforts like now. Regarding sincere efforts, we should praise and sharply criticize, regardless of results. I hope we will make a safe workplace together, and I hope that we have the perception we can do so.
Choi: We’ve had a long conversation. Based on the evaluation of the current occupational accident prevention policy, it was a chance to look into the future direction. I would like to hear more thoughts on preparing future policy for occupational accident prevention. Thank you.