Sharon Keogan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Minister is very welcome. This is an issue known to every employer in the construction industry in the country. Safe Pass has become the quintessential example of bureaucratic red tape. It is a system that has become engorged on self-importance and is now treated as a prerequisite for even thinking about entering a building site. The Safe Pass system was introduced at the turn of the millennium and was championed by trade unions as something that will save lives. This has not proven to be the case in the past 20 years. Since its inception the programme has largely been run by retired trade unionists who organise day-long courses that teach basic on-site safety. It is content that all apprentices know a week into their course. It is content such as lift from the knees and not from the back, do not do a two-person job solo and do not walk under machines. It is the stuff most people would not even need to be told.

The course costs approximately €200, which is paid by the employer. At this price we would expect the administration to be top notch but apparently it is not. I spoke to an employer who said the cards are printed in eastern Europe and some workers sit around for months waiting for the plastic rectangle that will allow them to get on the job. Of course this would be much too handy a gig to only get one shot at each worker so SOLAS put an expiry date on the card of four years, after which people have to do a retraining course. It is a constant money mill.

Employers are exempt from the requirement to have a card but almost all of them get one anyway. Otherwise they are subjected to too much hassle trying to get past security on sites. Sometimes the security staff are not aware of the exemption for the employer. These men and women running our construction companies end up sitting through the course just to save time in the long run.

If it were just the Safe Pass perhaps it could be let slide but it seems that every year new safety courses are dreamt up and new cards are required to do anything on site, from manual handling certificates to aerial lift training, green business certificates and American Concrete Institute certificates. One employer told me he saw a young worker with so many cards he needed to carry one of the old-style American fold-out wallets that flip down. He had reams of them.

This system has barely been updated since its inception. There is something very wrong with it. It is simultaneously the laughing stock of the construction industry and the bane of its existence. To think a seasoned construction worker needs to be reminded of safety fundamentals every four years is absurd. If the Minister insists on testing these workers at least let them take it online where a pass would automatically refresh their card, rather than having the nation's workers march off to a function room every few years to watch the same old PowerPoint as on the previous occasion.

In a case taken by Mr. Fergal O'Connor we saw that infinite reassessment was never the plan for the construction industry. What is being done to implement this ruling? When can we expect to see the meaningful change needed in this area for quite some time?