Bruce Monkhouse said:
How are the Unions creating a workplace?? Management creates a workplace...........the Unions follow the rules that management lays out,,,,,,,,,,,,,now, if management is crooked....
Bruce, I'm not going to lecture. We, you and I, know for a fact the unions, and workers, do not always follow the rules management lays out. The OHSA lays out the rules and standards for ALL workplace parties to follow. It's part of the IRS. Section 28 states the rules for workers. A large number of contraventions I cite and tickets I give is because the WORKERS consistently fail to follow the law or employers terms of employment.
There are also workers, in certain bargaining units, that consistently do work refusals to get immediate attention, even though they know their WR will be changed to a complaint under section 43. Yet they persist in wasting money and tying up valuable resources calling them in anyway, in order to score a large number of safety points against the employer for grievances and bargaining purposes. I have yet to attend a work refusal, and I've done more than a few, with that bargaining unit that actually fit the definition of a work refusal. They were all changed to complaints, even the ones that the union, who knows they are not WRs, also launched. Why? Because they think they are more important that the critical injury I'm attending, where someone has fallen two stories and is laying there with two broken legs and a broken pelvis.
The Internal Responsibility System is not a one way street with the employer responsible for everything.
And make no mistake. I've had unions try bend the rules, utilize a partial phrase instead of using the whole section in context, sit at the table banging on it with fists and hurling expletives, at the calm, composed employers like a bunch of out of control chimpanzees throwing feces.
All that saying is, that contrary to your opinion, it is a two way street. The unions and workers can, and are, just as culpable as the employer for many of the problems found in workplaces.
Let me put another spin on it. Some of the cleanest, safest workplaces, with excellent safety records and workers earning competitive wages and benefits, while enjoying all kinds of perks for productivity and gladly sharing equal responsibility, with the employer, for the workplace, are non union shops.
I wonder why that is.