Permanence and prevention are two central themes in an agreement
between the Danish government, the Socialist People’s Party (SF) and
the Red-Green Alliance to allocate 135 million Danish kroner (€18m)
over the next four years for a range of work environment measures.
The money will be aimed at preventing violence, threats, workplace
accidents and burnout. Hospital workers and school teachers will
be given the chance to learn new ways of avoiding violence and threats.
The agreement also improves measures aimed at helping people who are
psychologically tired to stay in the labour market. So far people who
have been physically tired have had the opportunity to get help to
change work tasks or trades. This will now also be available for people
who are psychologically tired.
The agreement also means more money for work environment research,
including research into whether nano particles can have an impact on
consumers’ and workers’ health.
There will be improved control measures against social dumping,
Foreign companies operating in Denmark must register there. This will
now be expanded to include foreigners operating as sole traders in
Denmark.
It will also be possible to report workplace accidents from the
casualty department and there will be money allocated to strengthen the
fight against sexual harassment.
The Minister for Employment Henrik Dam Kristensen (the Social
Democratic Party) is particularly happy that the agreement will secure
even more jobs by preventing accidents, violence and burnouts.
“Even though we have a fundamentally good work environment in
Denmark, there are still workplaces where safety and health is not up
to scratch — and we are going to put a stop to that,” he says.
