November 16 – Widely criticised over the treatment of migrant workers employed on construction sites, organisers of the World 2022 in Qatar have given the green light for its stadiums to be inspected by officials of the Building and Wood Workers’ International (BWI), a global federation of some 300 trade unions in the building industry that has a combined membership of more than 12 million workers.
Inspections will begin in January 2017 and will cover labour and accommodation inspections on world cup projects. “The joint inspections will initially focus on projects that are being built by multinational companies that are headquartered in countries where BWI currently has representation,” said a BWI press release.
“This agreement with BWI is an important step forward and proves our involvement in the health and safety of workers,” said 2022 Supreme Committee secretary general Hassan Al-Thawadi.
The inspections will be followed by a report, drafted “independently” by a Joint Working Group (JWG) formed of Qatar Supreme Committee and BWI nominees. It will be made public after each meeting.
Discussions between both parties began in March 2014, and culminated with the MoU, being officially signed in Qatar at the SC’s Doha headquarters yesterday.
Ambet Yuson, General Secretary of BWI, said: “This is an important step to build on the mechanisms currently in place which ensure workers’ safety on projects directly related to the 2022 FIFA World Cup. As a global union, BWI will now work with the SC to review and assess the SC’s health and safety training system. We will get access to worksites and conduct labour inspections which are important preventive mechanisms against work-place accidents.”
There are currently eight World Cup construction sites underway across Qatar with just under 10,000 workers on-site at any given time. That number is expected to rise to 36,000 in the next 12 months.
Last month, Qatar announced for the first time the death of a worker on the construction site of a stadium as a result of an industrial accident.
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