SBS SHOW -- HAZARDOUS CHEMICALS

Date: 01 August 2001

This show should be worth watching or taping tomorrow night (Thursday 2 August).

On Thursday 2nd August at 8.30pm on SBS Television, INSIGHT (National Current Affairs Program) is airing an investigative report on Hazardous Chemicals in the Australian Workplace

SBS MEDIA RELEASE: - HAZARDOUS CHEMICALS IN THE WORKPLACE

If asbestos came into Australia today as a new substance, this country's regulator would not have the scientists to recognise and deal with the danger!

That astonishing claim on SBS' INSIGHT program this Thursday at 8.30 is made by a former senior staffer with the National Occupational Health and Safety Commission.

The Commission's own figures are staggering:
** More than 2,000 workers die every year from chemically related illnesses,
** 18 hundred of those are occupational cancers.

According to the experts there are wide gaps in knowledge about the chemicals we use and their harmful effects on workers.

Yet, the key government commission whose job it is to set the safety standards for the use of those chemicals is getting rid of its scientists. Its budget has been almost halved, while its research capacity and responsibility for workplace safety has been shifted to the States and industry.

The former founding director of the Commission's Chemical Division, Mr. Warwick Pearce, tells INSIGHT that if the asbestos debate were raging today the Commission would not be in a position to do the necessary research.

< "They were saying that people were exaggerating the effects of asbestos and without the independent research they'd probably still be saying that." Mr. Pearce says.

The commission is so sensitive to criticism that it has attempted to stop INSIGHT reporter Sarah Ferguson talking to its staff.

INSIGHT talks to nurses with 20 years experience who claim to be so damaged by one particular chemical they can no longer work.

Hundreds of nurses have suffered chronic health problems after using Glutaraldehyde and its still used in hospitals across Australia.

For further information

Contact:	Les Carr
Union:	Public Service Association of NSW
Phone:	9220 0939
Email:	lcarr@psa.asn.au
WWW:	http://psa.labor.net.au/

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