Queensland workers want to scrap the Australian Building and Construction Commission. Unions say it is not efficient and they used Workers Memorial Day to ram home the point.

Milly Dimitrijevic reports.

TRANSCRIPT

Queensland’s Council of Unions says there have been 40 work-related deaths in Australia this year.

Last year, 186 Australians were killed at work, 22 in Queensland.

The Council say employees and unions are being threatened by fines and injunctions.

Ros McLennan, Queensland Council of Unions: “In 2016 there were 35 workers killed on construction sites in Australia, and the ABCC, since its inception, has not prosecuted one single employer.”

Dale Kennedy was 20 when he was electrocuted after piercing an insulated cable that didn’t have a safety switch.

His family support proposed legislation changes based on Queensland’s health and safety laws.

Debbie Kennedy, mother of Dale Kennedy: “It’s a day of awareness as Tamara was saying, because we wouldn’t like anyone else to go through what we have gone through and we heard someone else about a family losing a family member before Christmas and that was us too.”

Advocates say the risk of death and injury at work is real for all workers.

The building unions say that injury and death rates may be higher because many incidents go unreported.

The union movement says the right to safe workplaces is one of its most enduring achievements.

Milly Dimitrijevic, QUT News.