The network's president, Somboon Srikhamdokkhae, said the group had long been pushing for this and had high hopes that an institute to oversee workplace health, safety and environmental concerns would materialise.

The idea was put forward after the 1993 blaze at the Kader Doll factory that killed 188 female workers and injured 469 others, but the institute has not yet materialised.

"It has even been obstructed by the Labour Ministry," Somboon said.

The Kader factory tragedy had its 14th anniversary this month.

Whenever the draft bill prepared by workers and non-governmental organisations reached Parliament, it always clashed with the ministry's draft Occupational Health, Safety and Environment Bill, which held everything under the ministry's control, she said.

The workers' draft calls for the new entity to be independent under the supervision of the Labour Ministry and for private organisations to inspect business establishments, rather than leaving everything to a government agency as stipulated in the ministry's draft, she said.

"The draft by the ministry authorises state agencies to inspect business establishments, while the workers' draft empowers legally registered private organisations to inspect workplaces," Somboon added.

While waiting for the draft to become law, the network plans to propose suggestions for solving workers' short- and long-term problems to Prime Minister Surayud Chulanont late this month.

The key short-term points cover a separation of the power to diagnose illness from the fund that considers compensation, and the revocation of the ministry's draft Occupational Health, Safety and Environment Bill.

The suggestions also include granting workers the right to access occupational health services and to enjoy rights under the Social Security Office's Workmen's Compensation Fund, without the present conditions that create obstacles.

Somboon said the problem for Thai workers was that they receive medical treatment as outpatients under the Social Security Office (SSO), rather than as work-hazard victims. This results in their being deprived of compensation from the Workmen's Compensation Fund and treatment from occupational health experts.

In order to be treated at the fund's occupational health clinic at Nopparat Ratchathani Hospital, workers must prove the injury or illness resulted from work. This takes time and entails transport costs, so many workers just give up, she said.

Besides, the shift from the SSO to the fund's service is painstakingly slow and some workers - cut off from SSO subscriptions - are put on hold pending the fund's decision on whether they can be treated under it, Somboon added.

As long-term solutions, she said, workers wanted the government to approve their draft for establishing an institute, to have a clear policy for producing occupational health practitioners and to establish a fund for patients suffering from industrial pollution.

Labour Protection and Welfare Department chief Padungsak Thephasdin na Ayutthaya conceded that the work-safety law was not enforced strictly due to the advance of chemical technology, which makes chemical-related illness a highly difficult area, a and a shortage of staff at the ministry.

Padungsak said work-safety inspections between October 2006 and last month in 80,027 workplaces had found that 10.75 per cent had no security guards, 7 per cent had no fire prevention or fire-escape plan in place, 4.6 per cent had no worker-safety committee, and 0.95 per cent had no safety measures for electrical and machine hazards.

Another report covering the whole of 2006 found that 2,681 workplaces out of 20,026 inspected establishments - with a total of 210,607 workers - had breached labour laws. However, only 237 faced legal action amounting to a combined Bt2.2 million in fines, he said.

Labour Minister Apai Chandanachulaka told a press conference held ahead of the "21st National Work Safety Week" - from May 10-12 at Impact Muang Thong Thani - that 204,257 people had been killed, injured or were taken ill as a result of work last year.

He said 808 had died, 21 became disabled, 3,413 partially lost organs, and 51,901 stopped work for more than three days. The Workmen's Compensation Fund had paid an increasing amount of compensation in the past five years and last year's Bt1.7 billion was a 39.5-per-cent jump from previous years.

Some workers also shared with The Nation their accounts of a lack of protection from work hazards, and how they were left to struggle on their own.

A Samut Prakan textile factory worker, Wassana Klaipetch, 51, spent more than 20 years weaving at a factory and last year suffered severe pain in her shoulder. A doctor at an SSO hospital said she had a repetitive strain injury and needed surgery. She was transferred to Chulalongkorn Hospital for the procedure, which left her paralysed in the right part of body and has been unable to work for six months.

Needing a medical certificate from the SSO hospital to say her injury was work-related so as to qualify for the Workmen's Compensation Fund, she was told that as she had received her treatment outside working hours, the doctor could not declare the injury was occupational.

Wassana was told to make a further application on May 10, but she is uncertain about the outcome.

The factory in the meantime pressed her to quit the job, with a five-month salary payment. After discussions with Somboon, who assured her it would not affect her claim for compensation, Wassana quit her job.

Another worker in a sack-making factory at Nakhon Pathom said he had mixed strong-smelling chemical dyes and substances - including the carcinogen isopropyl alcohol - on a daily basis for 10 years before he was diagnosed with spotty lung and a lump in his neck suspected to be cancer.

He was later told that if he shifted to the Workmen's Compensation Fund's medical services, he must first return the money paid for his illness by the SSO.

Chularat Saengpassa

The Nation