Employer and Supervisor fined after Co-op Student Injured

News Release

CRS Specialties Inc. and Supervisor Fined $59,000 After Co-op Student Injured

April 9, 2013 4:20 pm  Ministry of Labour

St. Catharines, ON - CRS Specialties Inc., a Welland manufacturer of rebar bending equipment, was fined $55,000 for a violation of the Occupational Health and Safety Act after a student, working there as a co-operative education placement, was injured. A further fine of $4,000 was imposed on a supervisor for a similar violation of the act during the investigation of the incident.

On March 23, 2011, at the company's Welland workplace, the student was taking apart a fan and washing it in a Varsol bath. When finished, the student was told to start a welding task. When beginning the task, the young worker was wearing a polyester-blend sweatshirt over overalls. Polyester materials are susceptible to ignition and should not be worn while welding. The student was not supplied with a welding jacket, welding sleeves, neck shroud or flame-retardant clothing. The supervisor did not intervene to make sure the student removed the sweatshirt and had sufficient apparel to prevent injury.

While the student was welding, the sweatshirt ignited and caught fire. The student suffered second degree burns.

Later, on March 28, 2011, while the Ministry of Labour was investigating that incident, an inspector saw another worker in the same workplace not wearing apparel sufficient to prevent injury while welding. The worker was wearing a polyester-blend sweatshirt and only one welding sleeve.

CRS Specialties Inc. pleaded guilty to failing to ensure that a competent person was appointed as supervisor.

Supervisor Chad Corriveau pleaded guilty to failing to ensure that a worker was wearing apparel sufficient to protect the worker from injury while welding.


The fines were imposed by Justice of the Peace B. Phillips. In addition to the fine, the court imposed a 25-per-cent victim fine surcharge, as required by the Provincial Offences Act. The surcharge is credited to a special provincial government fund to assist victims of crime.


Court Information at a Glance

Location:                      Ontario Court of Justice
                                      71 King St.
                                      St. Catharines, ON

Judge:                          Justice of the Peace B. Phillips

Date of Sentencing:     April 4, 2013

Defendant:                   CRS Specialties Inc.

Matter:                         Occupational Health and Safety

Conviction:                  Ontario Regulation 851, Section 84
                                      Occupational Health and Safety Act,
                                      Section 25(2)(c), Section 27(1)(a)

Crown Counsel:           Daniel Kleiman

Employers are Consumers: Learn how to Fight Back and Office Politics: the game everyone plays

By Franke James, author, Dear Office-Politics

When Ellen Roseman, author and consumer-advocate columnist for The Toronto Star, invited me to contribute to her new book, Fight Back, I was delighted. As you’ll read in my excerpted article below, Ellen was an instrumental pair of “eyes” in helping me fight back — and win!  FIGHT BACK 

I WAS FIGHTING A COMPANY over the faulty installation of a gas furnace and ductwork, which had caused major structural damage to our home. I wanted them to pay for repairs. The company had deep pockets and no fear of going to court. Its lawyer said in a surly email, “Go ahead. Sue us.”

Going to court could have amounted to financial suicide for our family, or at the very least, hardship. There was no way I wanted to fight this battle in court, or even in an arbitration hearing.

I wanted to fight it where the odds were more in my favour: the court of public opinion. And for most people that’s a good strategy. It’s a lot cheaper than hiring lawyers but it does depend on having good communication skills.

In my experience most companies will do the right thing – but only under threat of having their behavior (which often amounts to bullying) exposed to the world. Everyone – from private enterprises, to public companies, to local and federal governments, is sensitive to public opinion.

Excerpted from Fight Back: 81 Ways to Save Money and Protect Yourselffrom Corporate Trickery. Copyright (c) 2012 by Ellen Roseman. Excerpted with permission of the publisher John Wiley & Sons Canada, Ltd.

About Franke James:


Franke James, MFA is the author/inventor of Dear Office-Politics: the game everyone plays and the Founder of Office-Politics.com. Franke is also the author/artist of Bothered by My Green Conscience. Franke brings over 20 years of real-world business experience to her role as an adviser on OfficePolitics.com. See her 2012 quiz for CNN’s Global Office show. Franke has been quoted and featured in print, radio and TV on the topic of office-politics by the New York Times, Chatelaine Magazine, Inc. Magazine,  the Globe and Mail, Job Postings Magazine, CBC Radio, CTV News and other media.  (Follow her on Twitter @officepolitics and @frankejames) 



About Ellen Roseman and ‘Fight Back’:

Ellen Roseman is a journalist who sticks up for ordinary Canadians. As a long-time advocate for consumer rights, she’s become a brand name for activism and a champion at helping consumers fight back against injustices. Her columns appear three times a week in the Toronto Star and her popular blog, EllenRoseman.com, has been online since 2007. She’s the author of seven books, including Money 101: Every Canadian’s Guide to Personal Finance and Money 201: More Personal Finance Advice for Every Canadian. She teaches investing and personal finance at the University of Toronto’s continuing studies department and Ryerson University’s Chang School, and is on the board of FAIR (Canadian Foundation for Advancement of Investor Rights) and Community Legal Education Ontario (CLEO).

In Fight Back, Ellen Roseman distills the financial advice she gives in her columns and blogs into 81 quick tips that all Canadians can use to help them spend sensibly, save money, and avoid costly consumer traps. This book of “personal finance greatest hits” is filled with illustrative examples and cautionary advice from Roseman and stories from her faithful readers. Filled with a wealth of information, the book includes the low-down on dealing with banks and car dealers, cutting costs of communication services, improving your credit, buying and renovating a home, fighting online fraud, ensuring you have the right insurance, and more.

Ellen Roseman has assisted HRNC to fight back!

Proactive Employment Standards Inspections

Proactive may be another way of saying "without a complaint".  Ministry of Labour Officers often used to be reactive NOT proactive. For instance, if an employee made a complaint about an employer the MOL would come and investigate. The Chief Prevention Officer wants to change that. By hiring and training more officers; putting out more public warnings; using social media to repeat the warnings and make sure all those "unknown" employers comply.

If you are in business it is time to make it your business to find out what your employer obligations demand of you with regards to the understanding of your employees' rights and safety.

Ontario will help ensure fairness in the workplace by enhancing the enforcement of the Employment Standards Act, 2000 (ESA) through proactive inspections. Each year, employment standards officers visit employers to ensure compliance with core ESA standards such as posting the ES poster, wage statements, unauthorized deductions, record keeping, hours of work, eating periods, overtime pay, minimum wage, public holidays, vacation with pay and in the case of temporary help agencies, providing required information to assignment employees and charging employees fees.

Inspections are also aimed at educating employers and employees about their rights and responsibilities under the ESA, and helping them to find more information. If violations are found during an inspection, officers may issue a range of compliance tools, including compliance orders, orders to pay wages/fees, or Part I Notices of Offence ("tickets"). In some cases, prosecution may be considered, and employers may also be re-inspected at a later date.

Chief Prevention Officer, George Gritziotis, wants complete compliance from all Ontario employers and businesses according to his talk to the CME-EAC last fall.

We are ALL responsible — employers, supervisors and workers — for preventing workplace illness and injury. Get involved now! Your search for workplace health and safety information starts right here…or here.

 

Safety is ultimately employer’s responsibility, not committee’s: Arbitrator

This is an interesting decision - the union grieved extra PPE protection for its' members.

Joint health and safety committee had power to prescribe safety equipment but employer could still do so without committee’s recommendation

November 2, 2012

The health and safety of employees is ultimately the responsibility of the employer and can’t be delegated to a joint health and safety committee, an Ontario arbitrator has ruled.

Gerdau Ameristeel, a steel manufacturing company, introduced a policy in its Whitby, Ont., plant requiring employees to wear chin straps on their safety headgear. The union grieved the policy, noting that the collective agreement required Gerdau to take all reasonable precautions for the safety of employees — in line with health and safety legislation — and to provide all personal protective equipment prescribed by the joint health and safety committee. The union argued this gave the power to approve safety equipment to the joint committee, not the company.

The arbitrator found that the Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act placed the main responsibility for employee health and safety with the employer, including the assigning of personal protective equipment. This legal responsibility did not diminish with the existence of a joint health and safety committee and a collective agreement allowing the committee to recommend safety equipment, said the arbitrator. If the employer didn’t have the ability to dictate equipment, then it would be susceptible to being charged and prosecuted for safety conditions over which it had no control.

The arbitrator ruled that Gerdau was entitled to prescribe personal protective equipment for employees, independent of the joint health and safety committee, regardless of the collective agreement provision giving the committee a say in prescribing equipment. The greivance was dimissed.

“Although I do not doubt this union’s commitment to the safety of its members, I do not believe that the employer can avoid its legal obligation, even when acting in good faith, to take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for theprotection of a worker,” said the arbitrator.

For more information see:

•Gerdau Ameristeel v. U.S.W., Local 6571, 2012 CarswellOnt 9066 (Ont. Arb. Bd.).

© Copyright Canadian HR Reporter, Thomson Reuters Canada Limited. All rights reserved.

http://www.employmentlawtoday.com/articleview/16594-safety-is-ultimately-employers-responsibility-not-committees-arbitrator

 

Goldcorp Canada Ltd. Fined $350,000 After Worker Killed

Timmins, ON - Goldcorp Canada Ltd., the operator of Hoyle Pond, a Timmins mine, was fined $350,000 today for a violation of the Occupational Health and Safety Act after a worker was killed.

On March 10, 2011, a worker was operating a scoop tram in a production area of the mine. A scoop tram is a type of mobile equipment used to pick up and move broken rock underground. Two workers approached the tram on foot and had a conversation with its operator about work to be done that day. The tram operator drove away to get a piece of equipment. While the tram was gone one of the two workers on foot began laying electrical wire in the tram's work zone and a third worker entered the area on foot. The tram operator returned to the area thinking there were only two workers there. The operator saw two cap lamps near the entrance and proceeded into the work zone unaware that there was a worker laying electrical wire there. That worker remained unseen and was run over and killed by the machine.

A Ministry of Labour investigation found that at the time of the incident Goldcorp had a procedure in place to alert equipment operators of workers in their area. This procedure required the placement of signs and flashing lights. While the signs and lights were readily available at the time of the incident, the procedure was not applicable in the area where the incident occurred.

Goldcorp Canada Ltd. pleaded guilty to failing to ensure that:

• there was a safety procedure in place in the area of the incident to protect workers when mobile equipment was being used
• workers were instructed on such a procedure
• the procedure was implemented through appropriate supervision

The fine was imposed by Justice of the Peace Alex Spence. In addition to the fine, the court imposed a 25-per-cent victim fine surcharge, as required by the Provincial Offences Act. The surcharge is credited to a special provincial government fund to assist victims of crime.

Court Information at a Glance
    Location:                    City Hall Council Chambers
                                      220 Algonquin Blvd. E.                                      Timmins, ON

Judge:                         Justice of the Peace Alex Spence



Date of Sentencing:    October 11, 2012

Defendants:                 Goldcorp Canada Ltd.

Matter:                           Occupational Health and Safety

Convictions:               Occupational Health and Safety Act, Section 25(2)(a)

Crown Counsel:        Wes Wilson

An Ontario court has held that an employer had no duty to provide safety training to a medical manager

[author: Adrian Miedem

An Ontario court has held that an employer had no duty to provide safety training to a medical manager on a function – the use of ladders – that was outside of the manager’s job duties.
The case involved the Emergency Medical Services Manager with the Parry Sound Health Centre. The manager took an extension ladder, leaned the ladder against the outside of a building, then climbed the ladder to check a heating and air conditioning roof unit that was not working properly. When the manager was 15 or 20 feet up, the ladder gave way and he fell to the ground and was seriously injured.

The Ministry of Labour laid an Occupational Health and Safety Act charge against the employer, alleging a failure to properly train the medical manager on ladder use.

Justice of the Peace Tenant, in the Ontario Court of Justice, held that the employer was not guilty. He found that ladder use “had nothing to do with” the medical manager’s job; that the manager should not have been using a ladder; that it was not foreseeable that he would use the ladder; that he was not asked by the employer to use the ladder or to repair the roof unit; and that he was aware that the proper procedure was to call a maintenance worker.

The court asked, rhetorically, whether it would be “reasonable and necessary to provide information, instruction and supervision to a maintenance worker on the proper use of a hypodermic syringe?” and whether, if a nurse was injured hanging a piece of art, would the employer be required to train all nurses in the use of hammers?

In closing, the court stated that it does not require “super-human efforts” to raise a due diligence defence to Occupational Health and Safety Act charges, and the Act and regulations do not “mandate or seek to achieve the impossible entirely risk-free work environment”.
R. v. West Parry Sound Health Centre, 2012 CarswellOnt 7703 (Ont. C.J.)

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Published In: Administrative Law Updates, Labor & Employment Law Updates

DISCLAIMER: Because of the generality of this update, the information provided herein may not be applicable in all situations and should not be acted upon without specific legal advice based on particular situations.
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