Iraq’s other resistance

Oil workers in Basra are ready to fight privatisation (…) In maintenance too, the Iraqi workers have outmatched their private-company counterparts. Walking round the Basra refinery, I pointed to the creaking and rusty equipment and asked the manager whether there were a lot of accidents, arising from failures of equipment under high pressure. The refinery manager said that accidents were rare, because however old the equipment it is constantly checked. “For an Iraqi refinery operator, the refinery is part of him,” he said. Contrast this with the disastrous safety record of British and American refineries. There, the frequent accidents are caused largely by lack of maintenance and inspection – which are in turn caused by the drastic downsizing of the workforce.

The Guardian