OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY IN INDUSTRIES (Standard of)

Mrs Yu-Foo Yee Shoon asked the Minister for Labour if he is satisfied with the standard of occupational health and safety in industries and whether the trend of industrial accidents in 1987 implies that attention needs to be focused on a particular industry.

The Minister for Labour (Mr Lee Yock Suan): Mr Deputy Speaker, Sir, the standard of occupational safety and health in Singapore is satisfactory as indicated by the statistics on industrial accidents and diseases.

In 1987, the total number of accidents reported to the Department of Industrial Safety was 4,155, a 7.7% increase over the 1986 figure of 3,856. The increase was partly attributable to the pick-up in economic activities last year. On the whole, however, the trend remained a healthy one, with the number of accidents dropping by more than 30% over the last five years, from 6,045 accidents in 1983 to 4,155 last year.

The construction and the shipbuilding and repairing industries remained the two industries with the largest number of accidents. In 1987, these two industries combined accounted for 1,479 cases or about 35% of the total number of accidents. Hence, my Ministry will continue to focus its attention on the reduction of accidents in these two industries.

In 1987, 1,073 cases of industrial diseases were confirmed. This represents a drop of 48% as compared to 2,068 cases for 1986. Since the introduction in 1985 of the compulsory medical examinations requirement, the bulk of the old cases has already been detected. Noise-induced deafness constitutes 70% of the cases. The noise problem is particularly prevalent in the metal-working factories and shipyards. The Department of Industrial Health will therefore continue to implement measures to control the problem, with particular attention on these two industries.