I feel like some of the most important parts of this new labor rights movement is still being severely overlooked. I’m referring to public health practices and lack of basic health and safety regulations.
I know this problem can be regional as I have worked in multiple states, but the current state I live and work in, public health and safety regulation is absent. The mandatory fliers are on the wall stating the minimum aspects of a safe and healthy workplace, but most restaurants and small businesses I’ve worked with (again especially in this state), don’t even have a proper first aid kit. I found this out the hard way multiple times.
Last night after requesting that we get a proper first aid kit and my boss saying (and this is a direct quote) “figure out what we may be missing and put that on the grocery list” I found out the hard way what we didn’t have. I had to run out to my car to get gauze and medical tape from my own personal first aid kit after accidentally stabbing myself when a glass shattered while it was in my hand. The simple band aid (pretty much all we had in the kit at work) fell off almost immediately from all of the excess blood. I also found out that the items I’d requested from my last injury still weren’t added to the kit. I don’t have medical insurance, and my job certainly won’t offer it…
… now back up to 2019. I was working at corporate hotel downtown. I was captain and in charge of multiple employees with a manager governing the department. There were so many health and safety violations that I started logging them.
There was mold in the sanitizer bottles, broken glass often in the freight elevator, trash residue all over our work rooms, the list was hefty. Anyway one of my employees did the same thing I did last night; accidentally broke a glass and stabbed herself. I hadn’t even realized we didn’t have a first aid kit in our workroom.
Our workroom was on the 4th floor. When I eventually had a meeting with the “uppers” they said “We have a fully stocked and well maintained kit on the first floor. You can take the elevators and be there in a matter of minutes. Regulations say that you need to be able to access it within 5 minutes and we’re compliant.” (which they did and it was up to code) This was one month after my co-worker got stuck in the elevators for the third time in his 4 years working there. He was stuck in there for two full hours…
…And yet they say that “we have a basic right to a safe and healthy workplace”
Do you guys see similar issues at your job(s). How do you keep your bosses accountable?
TLDR: I’m frustrated at seeing so much lack of regulation surrounding even the most basic health and safety violations at work.