Mining: Health and Safety

Dennis Skinner Excerpts

Tuesday 28th March 2017 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Disabled People, Health and Work (Penny Mordaunt)]

I thank the hon. Member for Livingston (Hannah Bardell) for securing this debate and for her passionate speech on an issue that is important to her and her constituents, as well as to the Government and the House. It gives us the opportunity to recognise the bravery of those workers at Burngrange mine, who, in providing for their families and securing resources for our country, made the ultimate sacrifice.

The hon. Lady and her constituents have rightly marked the 70th anniversary of that appalling disaster with honour and dignity for the men who did not come home to their families on 10 January 1947. One of the most moving parts of the tribute she paid was when she read out not only the names but the ages of those who were impacted. We got an impression from that of how the disaster affected a whole community. Often, people are in such a job for life. The age range of 24 to 50 gives a sense of that, and it was a very moving part of her speech. She has done a tremendous job in paying tribute not only to all those who were killed or affected by the disaster, but to all those who work, and have worked, in the profession and the communities that support them. It is a rare occasion when we read out in this place the names of people killed in such tragedies, but it is very fitting that she has done so. I understand from the Clerks that the hon. Lady tried to get this debate to fall as close as she could to the anniversary of the disaster. Things never work out perfectly, but her constituents and many others will appreciate that.

Before I go on to talk about the UK’s safety record and other issues that the hon. Lady raised, I would like to touch on some of the international tragedies that have occurred. She mentioned some; sadly, there are many others. In 1995, 104 miners died after falling down a mine shaft in South Africa. In 2006, 65 coal miners were killed in a gas explosion in northern Mexico. In 2007, at least 90 were killed in Ukraine’s worst mining disaster. In 2011, 52 people were killed in south-western Pakistan after a gas explosion in a deep coal mine.

It is important that we remember that this an international issue because of the role of the Health and Safety Executive, which has considerable expertise. Some 50% of the inspectorate that looks after this issue, as well as others, have worked in the mining industry for much of their career, and they have ambitions to export their expertise. The HSE’s latest business plan shows that it is clearly trying to do more of that. We have a good record on this, and huge expertise. We can make a real contribution, particularly in developing nations where often when disaster strikes the situation is unimaginable. This is important work, and I encourage the HSE to do it. It is doing a huge amount already. Recently, for example, it has been leading some work on ventilation issues in Australia and on engineering safety in Russia; the hon. Lady particularly referred to that country.

I pay tribute, as the hon. Lady did, to all those others who step in when such disasters strike to provide support and expertise to the rescue and recovery operation. I am particularly proud of this because the combined international rescue services that are contributed to by the UK’s blue light services train and drill for such events annually in my constituency. Her debate affords me the opportunity to pay tribute to them as well.

Burngrange and other mine incidents led to the introduction of a great deal of legislation in the latter half of the 20th century. The official report on that explosion and fire contains a number of important recommendations for improving health and safety in mines, including instructions on the use of safety lamps; how explosives should be selected, stored, handled and used safely; and the need for adequate ventilation and sampling of a mine’s atmosphere. Health and safety regulation in this country has improved greatly over the past 70 years, learning from previous experiences in order to try to prevent, as far as possible, disasters and other incidents that can lead to loss of life, injury or ill health. At the time when the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 was introduced, there were 651 fatalities to employees; today, the number is 105. That is progress made, but clearly more still needs to be done.

In 2014, following an extensive review, the Mines Regulations 2014 replaced all previous legislation relating to health and safety in underground mines—some 45 sets of regulations and the relevant parts of two Acts of Parliament. Importantly, they provided a comprehensive and simple goal-setting legal framework to ensure that mine operators provide all the necessary protection for mineworkers and others from the inherent hazards in mines. The regulations contain requirements relating to the key organisational aspects of safe management of a mine and to the key physical hazards to underground mining, the principal major hazards of which are unique to that particular sector.

In addition to the industry-specific mines regulations with which mine operators must comply, there is the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, the Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999, the Dangerous Substances and Explosive Atmospheres Regulations 2002 and the Control of Substances Hazardous to Health Regulations 2002.

About 2,000 workers are still involved in underground mining and they deserve the highest standards of health and safety. As the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) pointed out, often that will mean working in partnership with other organisations. I thank him for his intervention.

The Health and Safety Executive has a regulatory intervention plan for every underground mine in Great Britain, no matter whether it is still active or whether it is there for heritage and tourism purposes. That reflects the specific inherent hazards of mines and their previous health and safety performance. Those that bear the greatest risk and have the poorest record receive the most attention. Inspectors base their regulatory interventions on those plans, which are proactive.

I understand that the Scottish Parliament has tabled a motion to mark Workers’ Memorial Day—I do not know whether the hon. Member for Livingston will table a similar motion in this Parliament—on Friday 28 April, which affords us another opportunity to remember all of those who work in these important but dangerous industries, and to pay tribute to what they do and to those who have lost their lives.

[Mr Dennis Skinner (Bolsover) (Lab)]

I wonder whether at this point the Government representative could try to recall that those same miners that we are talking about, many of them the sons of miners who went down the pit, were the very people that the previous Tory Prime Minister, Mrs Thatcher, called “the enemy within”. We are talking about all those people who lost their lives, including the 81 in Creswell in my constituency who were consumed by flames and had to be locked in—they could not get them out—and the 18 people who fell down the shaft to their death at Markham colliery in Derbyshire. They were the same people that the previous Tory Prime Minister called “the enemy within”. I think at this moment it would be right and proper for this Government to say that that was not the reality about these people who went down the pit day after day. Surely this is the time to say so.

[Penny Mordaunt]

I hope that, in what I have said today and what I will go on to say, I have paid tribute to those people. My maternal grandfather was a miner. I have spoken about the hazards that people face in that and other professions. Without their service the country could not continue its industrial projects. We owe them a great deal. On the politics of these matters, the hon. Gentleman and I would probably disagree, but the purpose of the debate is to pay tribute to those who work in these professions and to remember those who lost their lives at Burngrange, in particular, and in other disasters around the world. I am sure that that will not have satisfied the hon. Gentleman—

[Mr Skinner]

No, because you won’t—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Skinner]

The Minister has failed to answer the point about the money that the Government take from the mineworkers pension scheme. Now there are no deep-mine pits left in Britain at all—just a few private mines and bit of open-casting—can we have an assurance that the Government will cease taking that money out of the pension scheme so the miners she is talking about get an even better pension?

[Penny Mordaunt]

The hon. Gentleman raises a serious point that deserves a serious answer, but given the limits on me in this Adjournment debate, may I ask him to write to the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Pensions?

[Mr Skinner]

I have done all that.

[Penny Mordaunt]

I am sure I do not need to encourage the hon. Gentleman to keep going, but if he is not satisfied with an answer, he should write again. I am afraid that I am not able to add anything to what the Pensions Minister will already have told him.

Unless there are any other interventions, I thank all hon. Members for their contributions. In particular, I thank the hon. Member for Livingston, who has done a great service to all those who lost their lives in this tragedy and to all those touched by it.

Question put and agreed to.