Rights advocates yesterday called for changes in regulations on uniforms for police and revisions to the Public Servants’ Safety and Health Protection Act (公務人員安全及衛生防護辦法) after a police officer in Taichung died in July allegedly from heat exhaustion.
Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Lin Shu-fen (林淑芬), accompanied by representatives from the Taiwan Police Union and the National Association for Firefighters’ Rights, demanded that the Ministry of Labor’s measures to prevent heat injuries should apply to all public servants and that government agencies should be fined for failing to protect employees.
Lin also said the National Police Agency (NPA) should propose similar heat-injury preventive measures as stated under the act, and that Taiwan’s police force should follow Germany’s lead and abolish standing regulations on changing uniforms based on seasons.
Photo: Tien Yu-hua, Taipei Times
Heat injuries are a severe threat to the health of police officers on duty and in the field, but current laws on preventing heat-related injuries are lagging behind times, Lin said.
Heat-injury prevention measures should focus on the work environment and field work hours should be adjusted to promote and enforce the concept of heat-injury prevention, she said.
Lin urged the Civil Service Protection and Training Commission to make a list of public agencies at the most risk of heat injuries and prioritize efforts to assist such agencies by drafting and implementing measures that would protect workers against heat injuries.
Taiwan Police Union member Hsiao Jen-hao (蕭仁豪) said that the death of a police officer in July was not an isolated incident, and yet the government is apathetic to the potential dangers of heat injuries.
Abolishing unreasonable, unrealistic uniform regulations can provide a simple solution, as well as sorely needed guarantees for officers’ health, he said.
National Association for Firefighters’ Rights deputy director Cheng Shao-shu (鄭少書) said it was odd that the top-bottom system of the NPA failed to address concerns over heat injuries for its officers, especially when they could reference preventive measures that firefighters have implemented.
The Civil Service Protection and Training Commission said it was mulling amendments to the Public Servants’ Safety and Health Protection Act to include specific sections on dangerous missions for police and firefighters.
The NPA said it would announce before Oct. 16 — when officers usually change their seasonal uniforms — that they can decide to wear short or long-sleeved uniforms.
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