Through the press conference held on Monday, the ELA Union presented the Bidelagun Foundation. The ELA Legal Services Officer, Amaia Aierbe, and Bidelagune attorney, David Pena, explained that the purpose of the foundation is to achieve effective achievements in occupational health, among other aspects, to make occupational prevention more effective and to reduce the thousands of accidents that occur in companies.
According to the published data, more than 50 people die each year in Hego Euskal Herria due to work accidents, and for each of them there are 35 more deaths due to occupational disease. The union denounces that this figure is unacceptable and that it does not create any alarm that it should create in the business world. In this sense, from specialization and legal innovation as a tool, the foundation aims to make illnesses and occupational accidents more expensive for companies than measures to avoid them. "It is clear that companies are beginning to worry about prevention when accidents are more expensive than these preventive measures," spokesmen said.
Another fact raised is that every year 40,000 people are discharged due to an occupational accident in Hego Euskal Herria, a figure to which must be added "thousands of people with psychosocial problems". In the face of this situation, the trade union expresses its firm commitment to this matter in the coming years.
The Bidelagun Foundation will have its own personality, will have its headquarters in Durango, from where the cases of Hego Euskal Herria will be addressed.