Back in the 1980s, I wrote a longish article on how pathetic the system was for protecting worker safety and health. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) never had real power or resources–my grey cells seem to remember something like it would take 7 years for OSHA to make even a passing inspection of every significant workplace. Surprise, advantage employers!

But, even the thin reed OSHA hangs on to is too much for the Republican zealots. This Tuesday, the House will vote on four Republican-sponsored bills to give employers even more power in the workplace to avoid basic workplace safety and health standards. To be honest, I don’t see any way these bills get stopped–but people have to know what’s happening so read it and weep.

Below are explanations of the bills provided by the Democratic staff. What I’ve also gotten are longer explanations of the Democratic opposition to the bills, which you can access–if you’re really a glutton–through the links from each of the bill numbers below.

H.R.742 poses the greatest threat to worker safety and health. The bill requires OSHA to pay attorney’s fees and costs for employers with 100 or less employees and a net worth of $7,000,000 or less in any administrative or judicial proceeding in which OSHA does not prevail. OSHA, as is almost every other federal agency, is already required by law to pay attorney’s fees and costs in any proceeding in which the agency’s charge is not substantially justified. H.R. 742 singles out OSHA, alone among all federal agencies, to require it to pay attorney’s fees and costs in any proceeding in which it does not win, regardless of why it loses and notwithstanding the fact that the position of the agency was substantially justified. In effect, unless the agency can guarantee that it will win every case it brings, H.R. 742 punishes the OSHA for trying to enforce the law. The OSH Act does not afford workers a private right of action. If OSHA fails to enforce the law workers have no other means of doing so.

H.R. 741 provides that OSHRC shall have deference to override the Secretary of Labor’s reasonable interpretations of her own standards. OSHRC is a quasi-judicial review commission. It is not a regulatory agency and should not have regulatory authority. The Commission is already empowered to disapprove and nullify or correct unreasonable actions of the Secretary of Labor. However, in a unanimous decision the Supreme Court has said, because interpreting regulations is a necessary adjunct to the rulemaking and enforcement powers that are vested in the Secretary, the Secretary should receive deference with regard to her reasonable interpretation of the regulations that she has issued.

H.R. 740 unnecessarily expands the size of OSHRC from three to five members and unjustifiably seeks to ensure that only lawyers are appointed to the Commission. The Commission has functioned with three members since its establishment in 1970. The authors of the OSH Act did not feel there was sufficient work to justify more than three members and experience has not shown otherwise. Experience has also shown that there is no basis for limiting Commission membership to those with “legal training” and that, in fact, the Commission has benefited from the participation of knowledgeable non-lawyers.

Finally, H.R. 739 creates a legal loophole for employers’ obligation to meet the 15-day deadline for contesting an OSHA citation or notice of a failure to abate a hazard. The deadline for an employer’s response was set at the 15-day mark to encourage both the timely correction of cited workplace hazards and expeditious handling of cases. The Commission already has authority to review any missed deadlines on a case-by-case basis in a manner that protects both employers and workers. H.R. 739 alters this process in a one-sided manner that disadvantages workers, encourages litigation, and undermines health and safety protection.