Senate Democrats seek to revive ergonomics standards

Revisiting an issue that Republicans had hoped was buried more than a year ago, a Senate committee today voted along party lines to revive efforts at imposing new workplace safety standards for workers suffering from repetitive stress injuries.

On a bill sponsored by Sens. John Breaux, D-La., and Arlen Specter, R-Pa., the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee debated for two and a half hours the move to require the Labor Department to come up with new, mandatory rules for protecting workers from such injuries.

HELP Chairman Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., said a Bush administration plan to extend worker protections "falls far short of what is needed ... It doesn't provide for any enforceable standards, doesn't cover all workers at risk, and instead of creating substantial worker protections, the administration has put forward a plan to develop a plan."

The committee's action comes against a long and contentious background--spanning more than a dozen years and several administrations--to put in place workplace rules to significantly reduce the incidence of millions of injuries caused by heavy lifting and repetitive motions.

The Clinton administration, shortly before President Clinton left office, ordered the Labor Department to impose rather comprehensive new worker protections. But last year, Congress invoked its regulatory review powers and nullified the Clinton move.

At that time, Republican opponents declared the issue a dead letter. And the new Bush administration directed Labor Secretary Elaine Chao to devise a new regime for dealing with the problem. Since then, most Democrats have chafed at what they view as the Labor Department's light hand in protecting workers, and came up with the legislation that the committee sent to the floor today.

During the committee debate, Sen. Christopher (Kit) Bond, R- Mo., said the Democrats' bill goes too far and "could severely damage the economy" by imposing impossible costs of compliance on small businesses.

"A vote for this bill is a vote against the viability of small businesses," Bond said.

But Kennedy defended the bill as calling simply for "technical and economically feasible" measures that would mainly affect a small minority of businesses that have neglected or refused to adopt new workplace rules to protect their workers.

"This bill would save people from pain and suffering that could be avoided," Kennedy said.

Even as the committee voted 11-10, on straight party lines, to report the bill to the Senate, Chao sent a letter of objection to the bill to the committee, saying she would recommend a veto if the bill reached the president's desk in its present form. That likelihood seems remote, however, since GOP opposition in both houses of Congress would make it almost impossible to pass.

In any case, the Senate is not likely to take up the bill until this fall, when its sponsors are likely to offer it as an amendment to the fiscal 2003 Labor-HHS spending bill.