Suzanne Shep­pard

Gov­ern­ment is tak­ing steps to en­sure that this coun­try meets in­ter­na­tion­al safe­ty and non-pro­lif­er­a­tion stan­dards with re­gards to ra­di­a­tion. Min­is­ter of Labour and Small and Mi­cro En­ter­prise De­vel­op­ment Er­rol Mc Leod, said yes­ter­day with many es­tab­lish­ments in T&T us­ing ion­is­ing ra­di­a­tion sources, work is on­go­ing on reg­u­la­tions to deal with oc­cu­pa­tion­al ex­po­sure. In re­marks at the open­ing cer­e­mo­ny for an Ion­i­sa­tion Ra­di­a­tion Safe­ty Pro­gramme at the Petrotrin Learn­ing Cen­tre, Pointe-a-Pierre, yes­ter­day, Mc Leod said the reg­u­la­tions would specif­i­cal­ly tar­get the pro­tec­tion of per­sons re­ceiv­ing ex­po­sure for med­ical rea­sons.

He said at present an amend­ment to the Oc­cu­pa­tion­al Safe­ty and Health Act pro­vides for in­spec­tors to take ac­tion where "un­ac­cept­able stan­dards of be­hav­iour or prac­tice, re­sult­ing in the cre­ation of un­rea­son­able risk, have been iden­ti­fied." Mc Leod added: "As we seek to in­crease our lev­els of com­pet­i­tive­ness and re­spond to the pres­sures of the glob­al econ­o­my, em­pha­sis must be placed on the pro­tec­tion of the most valu­able re­source of the en­ter­prise, the hu­man re­source. "It is there­fore im­por­tant to adapt oc­cu­pa­tion­al safe­ty and health prac­tices and stan­dards to the con­tin­u­ous­ly chang­ing con­text of oc­cu­pa­tion­al haz­ards.

"In­deed, reg­u­la­tions and rel­e­vant poli­cies must be de­vel­oped or amend­ed to mit­i­gate their ef­fects."

The Ion­i­sa­tion Ra­di­a­tion Safe­ty Pro­gramme is be­ing host­ed by the Oc­cu­pa­tion­al Safe­ty and Health (OSH) Agency of T&T to pro­vide tech­ni­cal train­ing to staff. The train­ing is be­ing con­duct­ed by the US De­part­ment of Labour.