GOVERNMENT is planning a toughening of Health & Safety regulations that would increase fines payable by those guilty of infringing them to as much as $1 million, the Mid-Ocean News has learned.

Health & Safety officer Doris Foley said work had been going on for about three years on updates to the occupational health law, including 17 proposed new regulations.

The news comes as the Opposition is calling on the Government to pursue legal proceedings against a company revealed last week to have breached occupational health regulations to show it is serious about clamping down on dangers to employees.

The Health Ministry's asbestos report, presented to Parliament last Friday, revealed that health and safety as well as planning regulations were violated by a company working on a Government housing project.

ACL Ltd., a construction firm run by former Progressive Labour Party (PLP) MP Arthur Pitcher, worked on the demolition of former US military housing in St. David's as part of a project to build low-cost housing for the Bermuda Housing Corporation.

On hearing that a toughening-up of safety regulations was in the pipeline, Shadow Environment Minister Cole Simons said yesterday: "What are the Government going to do about punishing people who break occupational safety laws right now?

"What will happen to Mr. Pitcher, for example, for the flagrant violation of the law by his company that appears to be revealed in this report?

"The laws are there to be enforced and the Director of Public Prosecutions has to take a look at this and see if there is a case to take forward. The report appears to show there is a case."

The report, which took three years to compile, concluded that ACL Ltd. had "removed demolition debris from the site without taking the necessary safety precautions".

DPP Kulandra Ratneser was unavailable for comment yesterday and a spokesperson for his office had no comment on whether there were plans to prosecute based on the report's findings.

Mr. Simons said the Health Ministry had a list of approved asbestos abatement providers and could pull the operating licences of those who failed to meet the standards.

"The Health Department has a responsibility to withdraw the licences of those who violate these regulations," Mr. Simons said.

"What happened here could have led to employees and members of the community being exposed to this hazardous substance."

Mr. Simons added that blame also lay with the Bermuda Land Development Corporation, as owners of the former baselands site, for not having an asbestos abatement master plan before the demolition teams came in.

Further investigation was also needed on whether ACL Ltd. had breached environmental law, added Mr. Simons.

The Clean Air Regulations 1993, made under section 11 of the Clean Air Act 1991, specify that "a person shall not release into the air a controlled chemical except under and in accordance with a valid permit issued to him by the authority for the purpose".

Asbestos is one of the substances classed as a "controlled chemical" under the regulations and the penalty for someone in breach is up to six months' imprisonment and / or a fine of to $5,000.

"We need to ensure that the laws we have are enforced, otherwise it's pointless having them," Mr. Simons added.

Around 100 pages of proposals for the updated safety regulations are available at the Health & Safety Office in the Ingham & Wilkinson Building on Reid Street for perusal by members of the public who are interested in them.

Mrs. Foley said the Health & Safety message would be the subject of a mass mail campaign to be launched in the New Year.

There was one well-documented industrial fatality this year, that of 24-year-old Bermuda Electric Light Company worker Malik Blyden in July.

Mr. Blyden was carrying out a routine cable test at the Belco Southampton sub-station when an explosion occurred and he died later from injuries sustained in the accident.

But Mrs. Foley said she believed the Health & Safety at Work Office had made real progress in getting their message across, particularly with the island's construction companies at a time when the industry was booming and the potential for an increasing number of industrial accidents was there.

"This year we have heard about a series of falls on construction sites, people falling through roofs and off scaffolding," Mrs. Foley said. "But I'm very pleased that there have not been any construction fatalities.

"There has been a lot of effort from this office concentrated on construction sites. And that is where we can really see changes for the better, and results."

Though regulations stipulate that every company with a workforce of five or more should have a Health & Safety Committee, many smaller companies are not complying.

Mrs. Foley said: "We are aiming at proposed amendments to the Health & Safety at Work Act. Fines will be higher, anything up to $1 million.

"One proposal is to reduce the strict requirement for every company employing five or more to have a Health & Safety Committee and make it ten or more instead. But those with nine employees and under will have to have one person responsible for health and safety promotion."

All this year Mrs. Foley's office has been running a four-day course for those from the world of work to learn what the potential hazards are in their place of work, how to formulate a health and safety policy, how to report and investigate an accident and how to take steps to prevent such an accident happening again. So far, around 120 people have taken the course.

The new proposals will also focus on a gap in existing regulations on buildings.

"When buildings are new, they have to be approved by Planning to get an occupancy permit," Mrs. Foley said. "A building can be closed down if it is in such a state of disrepair that it can be condemned.

"We would like to introduce legislation to ensure that the building is properly maintained up to reasonable standards."

Neither Health Minister Patrice Minors nor Shadow Health Minister Michael Dunkley were available for comment.