An agreement has been drawn up between the Construction Industry Federation and the Congress of Trade Unions to help improve safety on building sites. Eleven building workers have been killed in accidents on sites since the beginning of the year.
Building workers say almost 100 of their colleagues have died in accidents on sites around the country since the beginning of the construction boom in 1994. The most recent was 19-year-old Gavin Brady who died when a trench collapsed on top of him in County Cavan, just last month. Now in an initiative overseen by Minister of State, Tom Kitt, the Construction Industry Federation, the ICTU and the Health and Safety Authority have come together to set up a new body: the Construction Safety Partnership, which will produce a safety plan within three months.
In tandem, under a pilot programme, joint ICTU-CIF safety courses will be set up. Site safety representatives will be appointed and registered and will liase with contractors, supervisors and workers. This agreement breaks new ground in the level of co-operation between unions and construction employers. Industry sources described it this morning as "a start".
