[Congressional Bills 106th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 5037 Introduced in House (IH)]







106th CONGRESS
  2d Session
                                H. R. 5037

        To amend the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             July 27, 2000

Mr. Hall of Texas (for himself and Mr. Tauzin) introduced the following 
    bill; which was referred to the Committee on Education and the 
                               Workforce

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
        To amend the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE; REFERENCE.

    (a) Short Title.--This Act may be cited as the ``Workplace Safety 
and Accountability Act''.
    (b) Reference.--Whenever in this Act an amendment or repeal is 
expressed in terms of an amendment to, or repeal of, a section or other 
provision, the reference shall be considered to be made to a section or 
other provision of the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970 (29 
U.S.C. 651 et seq.).

SEC. 2. EMPLOYEE ACCOUNTABILITY.

    Section 9 (29 U.S.C. 658) is amended by adding at the end the 
following new subsections:
    ``(d) No citation may be issued under subsection (a) to an employer 
unless the employer knew or with the exercise of reasonable diligence 
would have known of the presence of the alleged violation. No citation 
shall be issued under subsection (a) to an employer for an alleged 
violation of section 5, any standard, rule, or order promulgated 
pursuant to section 6, any other regulation promulgated under this Act, 
or any other occupational safety and health standard, if such employer 
demonstrates that--
            ``(1) employees of such employer have been provided with 
        the proper training and equipment to prevent such a violation;
            ``(2) work rules designed to prevent such a violation have 
        been established and adequately communicated to employees by 
        such employer; and
            ``(3) the failure of employees to observe work rules led to 
        the violation.
    ``(e) A citation issued under subsection (a) to an employer that 
violates the requirements of any standard, rule, or order promulgated 
pursuant to section 6 or any other regulation promulgated under this 
Act shall be vacated if such employer demonstrates that employees of 
such employer where protected by alternative methods equally or more 
protective of the safety and health of the employee than the methods 
required by such standard, rule, order, or regulation in the factual 
circumstances underlying the citation.
    ``(f) Subsections (d) and (e) shall not be construed to eliminate 
or modify other defenses that may exist to any citation.''.
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