New Ontario Requirement as of January 1, 2014: Provide Safety Awareness Training Using Ministry's Materials or Equivalent

New Ontario Requirement as of January 1, 2014: Provide Safety Awareness Training Using Ministry's Materials or Equivalent

By Adrian Miedema, partner, and Saba Zia, associate. © Fraser Milner Casgrain LLP, Toronto, www.fmc-law.com.

Ontario's new mandatory safety awareness requirement is set to come into effect on January 1, 2014. This is a "do nothing and you will be in violation" obligation; employers who fail to take the active step of ensuring that all new and current workers receive the safety awareness training — using the Ministry of Labour's new materials or equivalent — will be in violation and will be subject to compliance orders, charges, and fines.

The government has said that it intends to file a regulation on or before July 1, 2013 making the safety awareness training mandatory and imposing the January 1, 2014 deadline.

Mandatory for all Workplaces Covered by OHSA

At this point, it appears that almost all Ontario workplaces will be affected. The Ontario Ministry of Labour says, on its website, that the training will be mandatory for all workplaces currently covered by the Occupational Health and Safety Act ("OHSA"), regardless of sector, including industrial establishments, construction projects, health care and residential facilities, mines and mining plants, and farming operations. Even employees in jobs that are thought to have a low safety risk — such as many office jobs — must be given the safety orientation.

New Employees

The regulation will also require that any new employees receive the worker safety training as soon as practicable after commencing work duties, and that new supervisors complete the supervisory safety awareness training within the first week of commencing supervisory duties. New employees or supervisors who can prove that they received the safety awareness training at a previous employer will not be required to retake that training.

Ministry's Worker Training Materials

The Ministry has finalized and released worker safety awareness training materials that employers can use. The materials include a worker workbook, "Worker Health and Safety Awareness in 4 Steps", and an employer guide to that workbook. Employers who train workers using the Ministry materials will automatically comply with the new mandatory safety awareness training requirement. Note that the new requirement is for basic safety awareness training only; employers will, depending on the employee's job, also be required to provide additional safety training, developed by the employer, tailored to the job.

Ministry's Supervisor Training Materials

The Ministry's supervisor safety awareness training materials have not yet been finalized. A version of the supervisor training materials is being piloted, along with an employer guide to the supervisor training program. The final version should be released shortly.

Required Content of Training

Employers who opt to use their own training materials instead of the Ministry's must, according to the Ministry, ensure that the training covers, at a minimum, the following topics:

Worker Awareness Training

• Rights and responsibilities of workers and supervisors under the OHSA.
• Roles of workplace parties, health and safety representatives, and joint health and safety committees.
• Roles of the Ministry of Labour, Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, and Health and safety partners.
• Hazard recognition.
• Right to be informed of hazards.
• Reference to an employer's obligations to provide information and instruction to workers about controlled products as required under Regulation 860 (WHMIS) of the OHSA.
• Latency and illness related to occupational disease.

Supervisor Awareness Training

• Rights and responsibilities of workers and supervisors under the OHSA.
• Roles of workplace parties, health and safety representatives, and joint health and safety committees.
• Roles of the Ministry of Labour, Workplace Safety and Insurance Board, and health and safety partners.
• Recognition, assessment, control, and evaluation of hazards.
• Where resources and assistance are available.

Previous Training May Not Be Sufficient

Although many employers will have already provided safety awareness training to workers and supervisors, if that training did not include all of the above topics and was not "equivalent" to the training program developed by the Ministry, then the training will not meet the new legal requirement.

What if you Miss the Deadline?

Employers who fail to ensure that all employees receive the safety awareness training before January 1, 2014 could be ordered by a Ministry inspector to comply — meaning, they will have to scramble to complete the training in short order — or, in a worst-case scenario, they could be charged and fined.

 

What Should Employers Do

Ontario employers should, in the near future, do the following:

• Review existing worker and supervisor safety awareness and orientation programs and consider whether they contain the content required by the Ministry's "Worker Health and Safety Awareness in 4 Steps" and "Supervisor Health and Safety Awareness in 5 Steps".
• If there are training gaps — that is, if your company's current program is missing content required by the new Ministry requirements — the company must ensure that the gaps are filled by the end of 2013. Occupational health and safety legal counsel can assist in determining whether there are gaps.
• Decide how the training will be provided: in person, by webinar, etc. The Ministry says that it intends to make an e-learning program available, at no charge, for employers to use.
• Review your existing training documentation: are you able to prove that your employees have received the safety awareness or orientation training that you have already done?
• Consider how you will document that employees and supervisors have received the new mandatory training. If the training is not properly documented, or you cannot adequately prove that a person received the training, the Ministry could still lay orders or charges.

The new requirement of safety awareness training is a sweeping requirement that all Ontario employers must be aware of. Ministry inspectors who visit an employer's workplace in 2013 may ask whether the employer is making progress towards completing the training. In 2014, inspectors will want to see proof that the training has been completed.

Original Article web-link

February 4, 2013