"Work Suspension During Major Accidents Has Limited Effect Despite Severe Damage"

Korea Employers Federation's Report on "Issues and Reform Plans of the Ministry of Employment and Labor's Work Suspension Orders"

A construction site of an apartment in Gyeonggi-do./Photo by Hyunmin Kim kimhyun81@

[Asia Economy Reporter Choi Dae-yeol] An analysis has emerged that when a serious accident occurs, the authorities' work stoppage orders are arbitrary, and the procedures for lifting them are complex and cumbersome, leading to increased corporate damage. The business community plans to propose reform measures to the government, arguing that work stoppages are not very effective in actually reducing industrial accidents and are used mainly as punitive measures.

On the 27th, the Korea Employers Federation (KEF) released a report on the problems and reform measures of work stoppage orders. KEF explained, "Despite the provisions under the Industrial Safety and Health Act (hereinafter referred to as ISHA), arbitrary and unreasonable work stoppage orders issued by the Ministry of Employment and Labor branch offices to workplaces where serious accidents have occurred, and the resulting corporate damages, continue, indicating that the fundamental problems of the work stoppage system have not been resolved. We issued this report because there is a need to comprehensively diagnose the problems of the current system and prepare reasonable improvement measures."

The report targeted 10 workplaces that received work stoppage orders after serious accidents occurred following the enforcement of the ISHA amendment in January 2020. The problems were summarized into three main points. It was found that excessive work stoppage orders are being issued at the discretion of inspectors. Inspectors were judged to have made arbitrary decisions without thoroughly checking the site or distinguishing whether the work was the same as that during which the serious accident occurred.

Problems and Reform Plans of the Current Work Suspension Order and Lifting System

The report also pointed out that the lifting procedures are complicated, causing prolonged work stoppages, and that despite being a strong administrative sanction, the effect on preventing industrial accidents is minimal. According to data from the Ministry of Employment and Labor, the average work stoppage period over the past three years was 40.5 days. The losses for the 10 companies surveyed by KEF ranged from 8 billion KRW to as much as 220 billion KRW per company.

KEF stated, "Work stoppage orders should be operated in accordance with the original purpose of the system, which is to evacuate workers from imminent hazardous work," and added, "They should not be misused as a means of penalizing workplaces and must be exercised lawfully based on legal grounds. Therefore, related provisions in the ISHA and Ministry of Employment and Labor guidelines need to be improved and supplemented." Lim Woo-taek, head of KEF’s Safety and Health Division, said, "We plan to submit a proposal from the business community to the government soon based on this report."

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