Burgess Owens: “OSHA, the agency responsible for the health and safety of workers in this Nation, is presently under intense attack.…”

“OSHA, the agency responsible for the health and safety of workers in this Nation, is presently under intense attack. Particularly my colleague, the gentleman from Georgia [Mr. Norwood], who is a fellow member of the Economic and Educational Opportunities Committee, has launched a relentless series of attacks on OSHA. Today, I would like to make a special appeal to Congressman Norwood that we lower our voices and make a sincere effort to humanize our discussion. Instead of focusing on the overwhelming but abstract statistics such as the 56,000 hard-working Americans who die each year from job related causes, from now on let us emphasize instead the individual workers with names and faces. There are workers in Mr. Norwood's district like William McDaniel, who without adequate restraining protection fell 80 feet off a television tower to his death in Pendergrass, GA. Like Paul Powell, who was crushed in the unguarded drive shaft of a machine at an Augusta, GA, plant. Like Earnest Gosnell of Homer, GA, who was operating a timber log skidder that had no safety belts when the machine overturned and crushed him. these fine Americans were all residents of Mr. Norwood's district in Georgia. What's really alarming here is that Mr. Norwood and so many other Republicans show no concern whatsoever for these workers and the other 56,000 hard-working Americans who die each year from work-related causes.”