Unions Sue Labor Department for Clean Air Regulations
Published by MAC on 2003-10-23
Unions Sue Labor Department for Clean Air Regulations
October 23, 2003
Reuters
Detroit - The United Auto Workers and United Steelworkers of America filed a lawsuit against the Labor Department on Tuesday, seeking to force it to set clean air standards for factories that could save workers' lives.
The suit against Labor Secretary Elaine Chao was filed in the Philadelphia-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, the unions said in a joint statement.
They said the suit urges the court to order the Occupational Health and Safety Administration to issue standards reducing exposure to toxic metalworking fluids, which are widely used in the manufacture of automobiles, farm equipment, aircraft and other products. "Breathing mist from metalworking fluids can cause severe respiratory ailments," the statement said, adding that these included pulmonary fibrosis, or permanent scarring of the lungs, which can be fatal.
It said the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health, part of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, had also found "substantial evidence that metalworking fluids cause cancer of the larynx, rectum, pancreas, skin, scrotum and bladder."
In 1998, the institute recommended a standard for factory workers' exposure to oil-based metalworking fluids 10 times more rigid than the current government standard, set in 1971.
But the unions, which first petitioned regulatory officials to reduce worker exposure to metalworking fluids in 1993, said the government had failed to act on the institute's recommendation or explain its reasons for not doing so.
A Labor Department spokesman did not return a call from Reuters seeking comment on the clean air issue and suit against Chao. According to Labor Department documents, the agency handed out a set of guidelines for working with the fluids, but decided not to set new rules for exposure.
"This is an egregious example of a public rulemaking process that has been obstructed by backroom industry lobbying," United Steelworkers President Leo Gerard, said in the statement. It is way past time, he added, for the government "to stand up to the industry lobbyists who don't care how many workers suffer from exposure to metalworking fluids."