One more accident at work. A worker fell from a construction in Marneuli and died on the place. This is the 12th case of death at work in the last 5 months of 2020. In addition, 72 people were seriously injured. It should be noted that the statistics of trade unions are not completed and the number of cases is even higher.
Although the Department of Labour Inspection has been given an unlimited mandate to oversee labour safety, the issue of labour inspectors remains a problem, which is a hindering factor to the effective functioning of this agency, as evidenced by the statistics of industrial accidents.
- One of the defect is that in most cases the person responsible for labour safety is formally owned by construction companies or this task was assigned to an existing employee.
- According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), there should be one labour inspector for every 20,000 employees in the country. If we take into account the contract employees and individual enterpreneur in Georgia, we should have at least 83 labour inspectors in Georgia, but we will limit ourselves to 30. Regional distribution of inspectors is also an important issue for the effectiveness of law enforcement. Unfortunately the place of dislocation of labour inspectors is only the capital.
- Till today, the issue of separation of powers between Agencies who are overseeing on labour safety issues – Municipal Inspections of the City Hall and Inspection of working conditions has not been regulated.
- We also consider it important to raise the awareness and training of workers involved in the construction sector on labour safety issues . We believe that the above defects are an hindering factor to the effective enforcement of labour safety