A third principle concerns the need for effective cooperation with other institutions, such as research institutes, universities, the prevention services of social security authorities, with NGOs...and with other experts; as well as the need to coordinate their respective labour protection-oriented activities. The complexity of technical, social and legal problems today is such that labour inspection cannot...ensure effective supervision of enterprises without external cooperation. It must have access to the aid of specialists...and, it must cooperate closely with a host of other actors. No inspection department can have a staff of agents covering all fields of functional competence. But every inspector must have sufficient knowledge to understand and assess the nature of a problem, to call in specialists when needed, and to preserve coherence in the simultaneous intervention of actors in very varied fields. In this manner, labour inspection becomes capable of conducting a ?global and coherent? action.

...Another principle relates to labour inspection?s increasing orientation towards...prevention. To speak of prevention in the context of labour protection implies, first of all, a determined effort to avoid incidents, disputes,... occupational diseases, illegal employment, etc. by assuring compliance with existing legislation and standards. Preventive orientation today, however, with the ultimate objective of developing a culture of prevention as a social and labour policy paradigm, aims more and more at the broader goal of enabling individuals to lead a long, productive and healthy life, and at the same time to reduce the exponentially growing costs of non-prevention, or loss caused by all manner of incidents to individuals, enterprises, and society as a whole. It is therefore increasingly defined as a holistic or ?open? concept, aimed at avoiding a multiplicity of technical, social, medical, psychological, economic hazards. One therefore notes a major change in labour inspection orientation since the mid-Nineties towards a broader, multi-discipli- nary approach to prevention. This vision-of-the whole is considered a prerequisite to dealing effectively in a preventative manner with the host of complex, interdependent problems....

The need for universal coverage: A last principle to be mentioned here concerns the drive for universal coverage, that is, the need to extend labour inspection's protective and preventive action to the largest possible number of working people in all areas of activity. In principle, society should not, and labour inspection cannot tolerate a situation where certain categories of workers are protected and others not.