Workplace safety
Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (09:49): At 11:50 on Sunday the CFMEU organised workers from across the union movement to gather at the West Gate Bridge and remember the 35 workers that lost their lives 53 years ago when a 112-metre span of the West Gate Bridge collapsed into the water and the ground below. Eighteen people survived with significant injuries, and each year we have less and less of those workers with us. We must never forget the lessons learned from this terrible incident in our history, and we must remember workplace safety. Every week two to three workers die in the workplace around Australia, and many more have digits or limbs amputated. The impact this has on children, on families and on all of these workers – it may be a grandparent; it occurs across all age groups – means it is something we must always endeavour to ensure does not occur.
In my first speech I spoke about working on a construction site as a probably cocky young 19-year-old. I did not want to wear my hard hat on a site working at Bayswater at Bunnings, and the CFMEU shoppie Rocky chased me around and made sure I wore it. One day, moving a temp fence with a 20-tonne excavator pushing it, I stupidly leaned in. The two bars let go and smacked me across the hard hat. If I had not been wearing that hard hat, I would have been significantly injured. So we must all be ever vigilant to ensure that we are continuing the trend of reducing workplace incidents and always remember that no job is worth someone’s life.