Under the scheme, people would identify aches and pains on an outline map of their bodies and then compare them with those of their colleagues to see if there are similarities. The union's argument is that many forms of industrial illness took decades to be recognised as such, so gathering evidence of links between particular ailments and particular workplaces will speed that process. Mr Monks said unions had identified most of the industrial diseases despite the resistance of employers.
Some employers fear, though, that publicity for an ailment prompts people to think they have got it.
Some doctors believe that some apparent sufferers of Repetitive Strain Injury, for example, only imagine it. But other forms of RSI where there are no visible signs and where the employee does not hit the keyboard as frequently are not so clear. Some doctors allege in these cases that publicity prompts people to feel pain they had not noticed before. But the TUC believes that if anything industrial injury is under-recognised. It says it has worked for decades to convince employers that work can make employees ill - asbestos was recognised as poisonous a century before it was banned.