Employers have duty of care to staff

IT IS common knowledge that employers do have a duty of care to their staff. This care stretches from the time the employee leaves home to travel to work to when the employee returns home. Furthermore, this duty of care might even stretch to when an employee complains about a situation that has arisen at the workplace but is now threatening them at home. An employer has to register all employees with the Department of Labour and, in particular, with the Workmen’s Compensation Fund.

This fund will at least give an employee some measure of protection should they be in any way injured or hurt on the way to and from work. This insurance also covers employees for any accidents that happen at work even if it’s through the employees’ negligence.

An employer has a duty to not only ensure that the employees are properly registered and that the monies are paid over to the Department of Labour, but also has a duty to complete the claim form timeously and properly so as to ensure the claims are registered with the department. It is also incumbent on an employer to follow up with the Workmen’s Compensation to ensure the employee receives the money for all the medical costs incurred through that injury at work.

In essence, employees are entitled to be safe in the workplace. This safety must be provided by the employer. If fellow employees or customers or contractors in any way threaten the safety of the employees this threat must be removed by the employer.

There is a celebrated court case where an employee was harassed by her manager and she in turn won damages against the employer for not properly protecting her. This protection is to be given even when customers or clients issue threats against employees.

Obviously, in cases of external threat, the employer must do everything in its power to ensure that the employees are not exposed to harm. This could stretch to physical protection through security guards and or security equipment and electronic surveillance.

More often than not, employees are exposed to hazardous working environments and or materials. The Department of Labour could be called in to conduct an inspection at the workplace in order to assess whether this situation requires greater protection from the employer. Tests are often done by the department and feedback is given to the employer sometimes with departmental instructions as to how to create a safer environment.

It is incumbent on the trades unions and the shop stewards to be alerted to the hazardous environment and to raise issues with management on a regular basis.

Obviously, if management is unaware of the risk, they are not going to do anything about it. Over and above this, any individual may telephone the department in order to raise a query, complaint or request an investigation. The individuals name will not be exposed to the management so as to avoid victimisation.

Bullying behaviour should be reported immediately and if necessary should be reduced to writing and raised through the grievance procedure at the workplace. If the workplace does not have a grievance procedure, there is a default code attached to the Labour Relations Act allowing any employee to come forward with legitimate complaints.

I commonly hear of complaints from staff about workplace managers expecting favours and or rewards for people to obtain their jobs and/or to get promotions. This is reprehensible behaviour and should be brought to senior managements attention as soon as possible. Clearly, any type of request for a “bribe” is not legal and if it is in any way institutional in the workplace then it should be exposed and can be done so through the whistle blowing legislation.

Management also have a duty of care to ensure that their staff remain healthy and functional throughout their careers. If any other staff member has a communicable disease such as tuberculosis, this should by rights be reported to management and that person should be placed on sick leave. It would be both illegal and unfair to expose other staff members to the diseases.

Drugs and alcohol at the workplace are taboo and should be outlawed by management throughout the working period. Being under the influence of any narcotic substances could expose people to possibly damage themselves or to others. This duty of care by management expects the management to harshly judge abuse of drugs and alcohol.

If management notice an individual staff member working machinery or any other dangerous activity who appears to have less control than normal, it is incumbent upon the employer to ensure that the person is removed from that situation forthwith.

The Department of Labour will issue fines and even notices closing down workplaces if they believe that the health and safety of the staff has been compromised in any way. These notices might call for practical solutions to be done forthwith.

On one occasion, I accompanied departmental health officials to a factory which tested the temperature and deemed the airflow to be inadequate and the environment to be too hot. There was a threat of a possible closure and the management chose to move quickly and enhanced the airflow within hours.