The United Steelworkers Union is starting to make headway in upholding the Westray Law, thanks to a movement called ‘Stop the Killing and Enforce the Law.’
The Law holds Management accountable for the safety of its workers on job sites, and is named for the Westray, Novia Scotia mine disaster that killed 26 workers.
Since its implementation in 2004, only 3 charges have been laid under the Westray Law, and all of them have come over the past year… Since the ‘End the Killing’ movement began.
Western Canada Director Stephen Hunt says it’s been difficult to spark the societal change, because it’s tough to talk about workplace death.
“It’s not okay to kill somebody and chalk it up to the cost of doing business,” says Hunt, “Especially in light of what happened in Prince George and Burns Lake. It was a glaring example of an inability to enforce laws.”
The Worker’s Compensation board recognizes an average of one thousand deaths on the job every year, but Hunt says that number could be higher.
The Criminal Code of Canada has the power to hold corporations, their directors and executives criminally accountable for the health and safety of workers, but the Steelworkers Union isn’t getting the results they want.
Hunt says rallying municipalities across Canada has seen improvements, but there is still more to be done.
“There have been a few law changes in respect to dust and dust mitigation in sawmills, and regular checks to ensure there isn’t dust accumulation, and that’s a good thing,” says Hunt, “All the recommendations from the Inquest (at Lakeland Mills and Babine Forest Products) have not been implemented, and there’s no legal requirement to do so.”
Hunt noted that this summer’s inquiry in Burns Lake did answer a lot of questions, and hopes that public perception towards unsafe work conditions will be held in the same regard as smoking and drunk driving in the future… But his biggest frustration is that Canada has the tools to deal with the problem, and they just aren’t being used.
“We all knew what happened in Burns Lake and Prince George. The question is, why did it happen? Why did the system fail so abysmally?”
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