Lead workers - Second Class Citizens

by Theresa Gordon,
 NO LEAD, Newcastle, NSW

The 1994 National Standard and Code of Practice for the Control of Inorganic Lead at Work may be an improvement on the old one, but it is a disgraceful effort by Worksafe, which falls short of a protective health standard for all lead workers.

Worse still, it writes discrimination on the basis of sex into a national standard. If lead work is not safe for women of childbearing age, then it is also not safe for men.

Anti-discrimination considerations provide the opportunity to improve workplace health standards for all workers in the lead industry and this new standard is an inexcusable missed opportunity.

In June 1993 the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) set the goal for blood lead for all Australians to be less than 10 µg/dL (micrograms per decilitre). But this revised national lead workers standard allows blood lead levels up to 50 µg/dL for all men and for women who can prove that they are sterile (eg have had a hysterectomy), thus effectively banning women from lead work.

I have worked hard to clean up a dirty lead smelting industry in the Boolaroo Community near Newcastle, NSW and it needs to be pointed out that Australia enjoys the benefits of trade and employment from the lead industry, but is willing to bend society's morals and sacrifice the health of lead workers as if they were second class citizens.