The National Union of Public Workers (NUPW) and Barbados Workers’ Union (BWU) have welcomed the government’s maintenance plan to address sick building syndrome.
However, Deputy General Secretary and Director of Industrial Relations at the BWU, Dwaine Paul, is pleading with the administration to implement a national policy that speaks to the enforcement of building maintenance, upgrades, and inspections in both the public and private sectors.
“The issue of sick buildings is not only for the government, but it is a private sector matter as well. So we are calling for the government, and particularly the Ministry of Labour and Ministry of Environment, to sit down with us and let us come up with an overall plan that could probably then be discussed with the Office of the Attorney General for enactment into law to probably govern these things,” he said in a press statement.
Senior Minister with responsibility for Planning and Infrastructure Dr William Duguid announced last Friday, a wide maintenance programme to address the issue of deteriorating environmental conditions in several buildings.
Acknowledging that indoor air quality problems, such as malfunctioning air conditioning systems and mould growth, have been primary culprits for the increasing prevalence of sick building syndrome, Duguid said the problem affects not only the well-being of government employees but also their overall productivity. Addressing the issue at a Prioritising the Safety and Health of Public Workers discussion at the Hilton Hotel, he said ensuring that these facilities are managed efficiently and sustainably is critical.
Stressing that the high level of absenteeism within the workforce could be linked to the sick building syndrome, Paul said while there have been talks about the introduction of building codes, a maintenance code is also needed to
ensure workers are not operating in environments that are not safe.
“The Barbados Workers’ Union believes that this is a forward step and a long outstanding step. We have long been complaining and speaking out about the upkeep of these buildings as well as the design of some of these buildings. We have moved away from construction which had natural ventilation to enclosed buildings with artificial air conditioning, which require different levels of maintenance,” Paul said.
“So, we support the initiative and we look forward to hearing more about it and actually the details to really resolve these issues that workers have been complaining about in government buildings for a number of years, where we even saw workers at some point in time removing themselves from workplaces because of environmental conditions.”
Meanwhile, General Secretary of the NUPW Richard Greene, noting that many of the union’s members often complained about the poor condition of the buildings in which they work, said he was pleased to hear that the government would be executing a programme “to bring some remedy to the sick buildings that currently exist in the public service”.
“This is something we have been looking forward to for a long time. While the NUPW is happy that there will be a policy to address the sick buildings in the public service, there needs to be an urgent response now to the current situation that exists,” he told Barbados TODAY.
“What we want to see in the policy is consistent industrial cleaning, consistent monitoring and evaluation of those buildings and a consistent maintenance programme. We want to see the policy measures allow for consistent monitoring and testing of air quality within many of these buildings.
“And when the testing is done, those results are shared in a timely manner with the workers and the workers’ representatives because what we have recognised in the past is these reports do not reach the workers, and, as a result, they are unaware of the true state of the environment in which they work,” Greene added.
He also agreed that working in buildings plagued with environmental issues has a negative impact on workers’ productivity as well as their health.
“If we look at the kind of complaints that workers have with respiratory illnesses and feeling lethargic at work, noticeable changes in how workers feel when they arrive at work, the NUPW can confirm the noticeable poor quality of the air in some of these buildings. And while not having accurate figures, the anecdotal evidence suggests that workers are definitely negatively impacted by these sick buildings,” Greene said.
