In
his May 12 OpEd “State underplays risk of return” fear monger, Fran Quilgey, refers
to the Chinese Virus, a disease 99.5% of us will survive, as a “perilous condition” and
calls moves to reopen the state “reckless.”
Quigley
informs us that, “Indiana law is clear
that unemployed workers are not required to accept offers of employment or
reemployment if conditions are not ‘suitable.’ The law says a job is not
suitable if it includes unacceptable risk to health and safety. Federal law,
too, is clear that workers are not required to appear or remain at a workplace
that poses a serious risk to health.” So
if someone can refuse work because of a virus that 99.5% of us will survive,
what in the world does not represent a “risk to health and safety”?
Are Quigley and his doom saying ilk eating these days? How did they
get their food? They didn’t come out
from under the bed to engage in the “reckless” behavior of visiting the Kroger,
a drive through or take advantage of a curbside food service did they? My guess is that they did. So seriously, can the conditions out there
really be that “perilous”?
My guess is that
Quigley hasn’t missed a payday. He should
donate any salary he has received since the governor unconstitutionally placed us
all under house arrest to charity, and he should continue to donate every penny
until the “perilous condition” is over by his own idiotic standard. Only when this virtue signaling showoff and
people like him are totally broke with at least two mortgage payments due,
should anyone pay the least bit of attention them.
We know what groups truly
are at perilous risk to the Wuhan Virus.
Rather than quarantining the healthy, maybe we should consider quarantining
people who are sick and the people most at risk of actually succumbing to the
disease while the rest of the world gets on with life.
What we do not need is
hectoring from preening boobs like Quigley who have zero skin in the game. Go broke, then tell us we don't need to go back to work.
tuesday, May 12, 2020 1:00 am
State
underplays risks of return
Right to refuse perilous conditions
well-established
Fran Quigley
Gov. Eric Holcomb and
his senior leadership team recently warned unemployed Hoosiers that they must
return to their jobs or risk losing access to unemployment benefits, even if
they believe going back to their workplace is unsafe. Those warnings misstate
Indiana and federal law and could put thousands of Hoosiers at risk of sickness
and even death.
“Claimants who have
been placed on a temporary layoff related to COVID-19 must return to work if
called back to remain eligible for benefits,” Indiana Department of Workforce
Development commissioner Fred Payne said during one of the governor's
daily news conferences.
“Getting the economy
back on track is of paramount importance,” Holcomb said, adding that the state
“can look into” getting involved if workers fear for their safety.
Yet the governor
followed that vague promise by emphasizing that Indiana's economic recovery
“requires every single Hoosier who has the ability to work to do so.”
As a matter of law,
these statements are overbroad and misleading. As a matter of public safety,
they are reckless.
These inaccurate
warnings by our state's leaders may cause some Hoosier families to lose access
to desperately needed benefits. Worse, they could cause Hoosiers to be exposed
to unacceptable risks of infection for themselves, their loved ones and the
community at large.
Indiana law is clear
that unemployed workers are not required to accept offers of employment or
reemployment if conditions are not “suitable.” The law says a job is not
suitable if it includes unacceptable risk to health and safety. Federal law,
too, is clear that workers are not required to appear or remain at a workplace
that poses a serious risk to health.
Determining whether a
work offer is suitable and whether a workplace is dangerous are complicated,
fact-sensitive legal judgments. Decades of statutes and court decisions dictate
that these judgments be made on a case-by-case basis, not in news conference
pronouncements by politicians.
What about a Hoosier
with a high risk of deadly COVID-19 complications, or their neighbor whose job
is at a plant with close-quarters working conditions? Neither the governor nor
his team are qualified to pronounce that these people will lose their
unemployment benefits if they do not believe it is safe yet to return to the
workplace.
From a public health
perspective, these warnings are ill-advised policy at a time when still-lacking
testing and rising infection rates mean that social distancing in Indiana is
still a top priority. Keeping as many workers as possible out of dangerous,
virus-spreading settings is one of the most important justifications for our current
system of extended unemployment benefits.
Hoosiers who fear that
returning to work endangers them or others have rights protected under the law,
rights that free legal services agencies can help them enforce. That is the
message Holcomb and his team should be delivering, not an ominous warning that
could trigger widespread sickness and an extension of the pandemic.
Fran Quigley is
director of the Health and Human Rights Clinic at Indiana University McKinney
School of Law.
No comments:
Post a Comment