Spring is here!

One of the first signs of Spring, other than the return of the robins, is the playing of the Masters in Augusta Georgia. And even if you are not a golfer you can’t help but notice that Tiger Woods is back!

However Spring is also a time when the new Carswell edition of the OHSA is produced and this year this publication is full of new amendments to both the Act and some Regulations. It is always a good time to replace the green book that is posted in your workplace but even more so this year.

The amendment to the Act is of course the introduction of Bill 168 which comes into force June 15, 2010. Also the MOL’s Guideline to Workplace Violence and Harassment is now available on their website as a free download, so get your copy now. If you have 6 or more workers you must have a policy and program in place by mid-June.

The 11 Designated Substance Regulations have been consolidated into one regulation which really makes more sense.

The Ministry has revised the exposure limits for 23 substances and added 2 new substances to Regulation 833 Control of Exposure to Biological or Chemical Agents.

There are also some changes to the Construction Regulation 213/91 which may affect those employers in the construction sector.

All in all Bill 168 is the single most important change that will dramatically affect most employers in Ontario. The MOL guide will be helpful in assessing the hazards, writing the policy and developing the program however many of you will require some direction and don’t forget about communicating this information to the workforce.

Help is only a phone call away and we are here to be of assistance so simply give us a call or send us an email. Meanwhile watch the Masters and enjoy your weekend!

MOL Blitz on Lift Trucks

The MOL has just announced their monthly blitz for February regarding a focus on lift trucks.

They will check for inspection and maintenance records, that this equipment is being operated by “well trained employees” and that it is being used in a “safe work environment”.

 Just what does this mean?

1. You should have annual inspection records of your lifting equipment available and have the provider’s stickers clearly identified on the masts of the trucks, including the date of inspection (must be dated within the last 12 months). Maintenance records should be up to date, whether you perform this work in-house on an “as required basis” or if you have an outside provider perform this work as a Preventative Maintenance Program.
2. Training records must be up to date. The current standard CSA B335-04 requires that training and retraining must be conducted every 3-years and as well a practical evaluation of the operator’s driving skills performed at the 18-month interval. We would interpret the MOL’s use of the phrase “well trained employees” to include the selection and use of a competent, proven, third party provider as opposed to in-house training. Also that workplace specific rules for the operation of lift trucks be in place and that these are being enforced by supervisory staff knowledgeable in the safe operating practices and procedures.
3. What constitutes a “safe working environment”? In reality there is no such thing as a “safe working environment”, there is and always will be a risk, however employers are expected to make every attempt to reduce the risk to a more tolerable level. The tool used to accomplish this is “Hazard Assessment”. We would therefore suggest that you are able to demonstrate that you have performed a hazard assessment of your facility, in particular to all areas to which lift trucks have access. As well a hazard assessment of the lift truck operator’s job position such as a “Job Task Analysis” or a “Job Safety Analysis” should be completed. This process will identify the hazards, rate these hazards for severity and make recommendations to implement specific control measures. These measures will reduce or eliminate any hazards, in particular those rated as being major and moderate, to a more tolerable and acceptable risk level. The end result is “Safe Operating Procedures” for these operators. Without these SOP’s how can these workers be held accountable?

We can be of assistance to you!

Although we do not perform the required annual inspections and preventative maintenance we can make recommendations for a qualified third party provider.

We certainly can provide the training your operators need, please click on our lift truck on our Home page for more information.

We can also assist you in the hazard assessment process and the development of SOP’s.

Please don’t hesitate to contact us for more information and assistance. We wish all of you success with any MOL visit now or in the future.

Get Your Cell Phone & Electronic Device policy here!

The Highway Traffic Act has been amended and Regulation 366/09 has been passed to clarify exemptions to the ban on cell phone and electronic device use in Ontario.

This new law took effect October 26^th however the police have said they will give motorists a period of grace until Feb. 1^st 2010 to focus on driver education.

Employers should make use of this time period to focus on the education of their workers by getting a policy in place for their employees. Don’t leave this task up to the police or the government.

They won’t do it!

The potential for vicarious liability by employers for any tragic circumstances arising out of a situation where their employee is driving while distracted by the use of any of the prohibited hand-held devices should be enough to cause every employer to act quickly to ban the use of such devices.

Such a policy cannot be overly simple as the KISS (keep it short and sweet) method would suggest. Consideration must not only be given to what is legally acceptable but also to what behavior is acceptable from the viewpoint of the corporate culture of the organization.

We have developed a basic policy for employers that can be adjusted to suit a variety of circumstances including enforcement and consequences for non-compliance.

We can be of assistance, simply contact us, but don’t wait too long and be sorry.

“Do you have your hands-free device yet?”

According to reliable news release sources, October 26^th is the date for the introduction of the ban on the use of hand-held devices while driving a vehicle in Ontario.

This would ban the use of BlackBerrys or any other electronic device to talk, email or text while operating the vehicle.

We’ve heard that police will give us a three-month period to become educated in this requirement but that by next February we could expect to be ticketed. Fines could range from $60-$500 but with no demerit points attached to the penalty.

Hands-free devices are exempt so far, provided they allow voice-activated dialing.

Be careful though as authorities can still charge any driver with careless driving, if they have sufficient evidence. Careless driving really means ‘driving a vehicle on a highway without due care and attention’ and carries a maximum fine of $1,000 and can involve a jail term as well as a license suspension. Serious stuff eh!

If you have started watching the new TV series “Trauma” you were recently shown just what can happen when someone gets so involved with texting while driving at higher speeds on a freeway. The driver caused a very serious crash involving a number of vehicles one of which was a tanker loaded with a flammable liquid which eventually exploded causing even more injuries to innocent parties. It was a very realistic sequence of events with devastating consequences. All of the statistical evidence acquired by the authorities, legal, insurance, medical and others would certainly support the fact that distracted drivers cause accidents.

This new law deals with only one of the means of distraction that we are faced with on a daily basis while driving a vehicle. The real question is “do we have to have everything legislated?” Drivers must be responsible and always held accountable for their actions.

Remember the old 60’s hit parade song “keep your eyes on the road and your hands on the wheel!”

“We’ve come a long way!”

October 1^st will mark the 30^th anniversary of our Occupational Health and Safety Act in Ontario. We’ve come a long way. This Act replaced the Ontario Factories Act which dates back to 1884. Some of us will remember the 1979 landmark date however few would recall the ‘good old days’ of 1884! It would be hard to imagine the working environment in the factories established across this province in those early years.

 We can only appreciate more and more what the enactment of this legislation, Bill 70, brought into being. We can thank Dr. James Ham, who chaired a Royal Commission in 1975, for his recommendations to create legislation to govern health and safety in workplaces. This gave employers, supervisors and workers legal duties to ensure workplaces were as safe as possible. These duties of the workplace parties are interlocked and support each other and became what is known as the Internal Responsibility System (IRS).

 The IRS is the underlying principle of the Act. The three words are not specifically mention in the legislation. And there is no need to as it really means that all of the workplace parties, from the president to the worker, collectively bear the responsibility for the health and safety of everyone. The good thing is that where the IRS is fully functioning the MOL inspectors have little need to take action in the form of compliance orders or stop work orders.

Bill 70 also established Joint Health and Safety Committees in many workplaces who have since become the cornerstone of the IRS. Bill 208 in 1990 extended the requirement for JHSC’s into more workplaces and also added the need for Certified Members on the committee. These members would be given specialized training to authorize them to ‘stop work’ in special cases where ‘dangerous circumstances’ were found to exist.

 In addition to the above mentioned legal duties, it does contain 3 rights for workers. These include the right to participate, the right to refuse unsafe work and the right to know about hazards in the workplace.

 There have been other amendments to the Act over these 30 years, however for the most part it is a timely document. Section 51 shows its age where it refers to notifying the ministry immediately of a death or critical injury at the workplace ‘by telephone, telegram or other direct means’. We can only assume that texting and email was not common 30 years ago.

 The latest proposed amendment to the Act was introduced in April this year in the form of Bill 168 addressing ‘Workplace Violence’. This Bill has received First Reading, the initial stage of the parliamentary process to enact a law.

 We should all celebrate the evolution of workplace health and safety in Ontario, making it a better place to be!

June 09 MOL Blitz

The MOL officially announced today on their website that their June Blitz will focus on young and new workers just at the time that these students have started their summer work whether part-time or full-time.

WSIB statistics show that 1/3 of all workplace injuries occur to young workers, defined as those 15 to 24 years of age.  

This Blitz is focusing on the service and manufacturing sectors and involve young , new workers aged 14 to 24 years as well as new workers 25 years and older who have been working less than 6 months or who recently been assigned a new job.

Clients involved in the retail sector, restaurants, vehicle dealerships, tourism industry, golf courses, camps, temporary amusement parks, tree planting, painting and landscaping should be prepared for MOL visits.

What will MOL inspectors look for?

·         General compliance with OHSA & regulations

·         Health and Safety policy & program

·         Competent supervisors in place

·         Orientation training for new workers, including WHMIS & 3 rights of workers

·         Emergency preparedness training

·         General worker training on reporting injuries & hazards to supervisors

·         Compliance with proper PPE & first aid requirements

·         On-the-job training performed by competent personnel

·         Supervisors regularly provide instruction and information to workers, and

·         Workers have access to supervision to report unsafe conditions.

Interestingly this is also the time of the year that the WSIB Young Worker Awareness Program (YWAP) gets a kick-start in high schools in order to make young people aware of the legal requirements at workplaces in Ontario.

Remember the YWAP program training provided by WSIB volunteers in our schools is NOT one of the training requirements that the MOL inspector will be asking you about! 

In our commitment to be your Health and Safety provider we are well equipped to assist you with your Health and Safety program and fulfill these training requirements.

Be prepared for this “Summer Blitz”! 

We can help!

For more information on “Blitzes” use our link to the MOL website and search under “blitzes”.

New Bill 168 on Workplace Violence and Harassment Introduced

Did you know that a new Bill 168 was just introduced in the Ontario Provincial Legislature? Minister of Labour, Peter Fonseca introduced this new piece of legislation as an amendment to the Occupational Health and Safety Act on April 20, 2009. He said “If passed, this legislation would help create a climate in workplaces across the province that says that workplace violence is completely unacceptable”.

MOL statistics show that inspectors made 198 field visits and issued 185 orders related to workplace violence during the period of April 1, 2008 to September 30, 2008.

If this legislation is passed, and we have no reason to think it wouldn’t pass, it would require employers to:

• Develop policies and programs to help prevent violence and harassment in the workplace;
• Take reasonable precautions to protect workers from domestic violence in the workplace; and
• Allow workers to remove themselves from harmful situations if they have reason to believe they are at risk of imminent danger due to workplace violence.

In basic terms this means developing programs to implement your ‘workplace violence policy’ and your ‘workplace harassment policy’ and to review these annually.

Workplace Violence

The program on violence in the workplace will require the employer to conduct an assessment to identify the risks and include measures to control these risks. Also included would be a means of getting help when violence occurs, a process to encourage workers to report incidents and to define the actions to be taken by the employer to handle these reports. The findings of this risk assessment must shared with the JHSC or Health and Safety representative and if none then with the workers.

If the employer is aware of or ought to be aware of circumstances that could cause a worker to be subject to domestic violence at the workplace then the employer must also exercise every precaution reasonable to protect the worker.

The new Bill amends section 43, the Right to Refuse Unsafe Work, by adding workplace violence as one of the circumstances that can trigger this right.

Workplace Harassment

The new amendment requires a very similar program to be implemented for harassment in the workplace detailing how workers can report incidents and what actions the employer will take to deal with these cases. The proposed amendment to section 43 does not apply to workplace harassment.

The Bill also requires that workers are trained in the requirements of both of these new policies and programs.

This Bill will come into effect six months after the day it receives Royal Assent and at this stage it has just completed First Reading of the Parliamentary process on April 20, 2009.

However that is no reason to ‘forget about it’ as Tony Soprano would likely say. We are convinced that the passing of this Bill is imminent!

We will continue to watch the progress of this new Bill and once it has been passed we will be there to assist clients with the development of the appropriate policies and programs.

Keep an eye on our website for new information on this issue and new programs to address it.

WSIB Workwell 2009!!!

Well if you haven’t received your letter from the Board advising that you have been selected for a workwell audit, you may have been spared this time around. The Board has recently selected a list of businesses, covering all sectors across Ontario, for their Workwell Core Health and Safety Audit and letters were sent out approximately March 31, 2009.

What does this process involve, if you have met their selection criteria?

An auditor has been assigned to your file and will contact you to set a date for the first phase of this evaluation process. On that date the auditor may conduct the initial audit at your workplace and subsequently a second audit after 6 months, should you fail the first. Or, they may consider starting you on a Risk Management Plan (RMP) should they discover that the Board’s statistics do not fairly reflect your commitment to improving health and safety at your workplace. Through your commitment to this RMP the auditor will continue to monitor your progress. You must complete selected elements of your health and safety program over an agreed time period. Follow-up reports are required to be completed and submitted to the auditor on a timely basis. The auditor will make at least one follow-up visit and if you have failed to meet your commitments, you will be subject to the full Workwell Audit, immediately. To read more about both the Workwell Audit and the RPM process follow the link on our ‘Home’ page to WSIB’s ‘Prevention’ page.

How can we help?

We have successfully developed an Occupational Health and Safety Management System to suit the needs of the WSIB Workwell Audit. This system of procedures along with our training will not only provide you with a passing grade on the audit but will also ensure you meet your ‘Due Diligence’ obligations as an employer in Ontario, thereby meeting or exceeding the needs of the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

If you have been selected for a Workwell Audit, we offer you a four (4) hour audit preparation consultation and it is absolutely FREE with NO OBLIGATION whatsoever!

Why not take advantage of this offer, see our ‘Workwell Audit Preparation’ page under ‘Services’.

New Crane Standard B167-08!!!

Well it has been a number of years, 2002, since Canadian Standards Association (CSA) decided a revision was necessary for the second edition of the crane standard, entitled “Safety Standard for Maintenance and Inspection of Overhead Cranes, Gantry Cranes, Monorails, Hoists and Trolleys B167-96”.

This revision, B167-08, now includes crane design and classification as well as crane operation including operator qualifications and training requirements which are all components not covered by previous editions B167-96 or B167-64.

As well this new standard incorporates selected material from ISO and ASME standards. In particular the crane operation requirements of this new standard directly reference the operator training in ISO 9926-1.

Although it has been a long time coming, the really good news is that the standard is now (February 2009) available to purchase online from the CSA website (see our link).

The ISO 9926-1 can also be downloaded for a cost of US$43.00 at www.global.ihs.com.

In January we announced the introduction of our new Industrial Hoisting, Rigging and Crane Operator Training program which we are pleased to say was designed to meet the requirements of the new CSA B167-08 and the ISO9926-1.

The revised standard requires employers to maintain a record of training (ROT) for each operator that includes an expiry date by which time refresher training should be completed. It then states that operators should participate in refresher training on the theory portion of the course prior to this expiry date. This should be followed by both theory and practical refresher training prior to the next (second) expiry date on the ROT. On all future expiry dates the operator should receive theory refresher and on every other expiry date should receive practical refresher training.

It appears to be left up to the employer or the training provider to dictate just what this expiry should be. The CSA standard for Lift Trucks specifies a 3-year period however for some unknown reason this standard does not. It would seem a little obvious that a very similar time period would apply to cranes considering that under our Ontario Industrial Regulation 851 this equipment is all defined as ‘lifting devices’.

At Busch Training Inc. we have decided to use the same 3-year expiry for crane training as we do for lift truck operator training and as well for operators of aerial work platforms.

Again we are very excited about our new program, but we will also be introducing other new and creative material in the very near future.

Watch for future announcements!

April 09 MOL Blitz

The MOL officially announced yesterday on their website that their April Blitz will focus on musculoskeletal disorders (MSDs) targeting the construction, health care, industrial and mining sectors. Inspectors will be looking at any job tasks or activities that require workers to exert force, fixed or awkward postures or repetition. MDSs are injuries and disorders of the muscles, tendons and nerves that can develop as a result of continued exposure to repetitive work, awkward postures and other factors.

“Musculoskeletal disorders account for almost half of all injuries in which workers need to take time off work in Ontario – resulting in substantial costs to the medical and workers’ compensation system. Ontario and its workplace partners are committed to eliminating all workplace injuries, including those involving MSDs.” - Peter Fonseca, Minister of Labour

Furthermore the MOL statistics show that in 2007, 43% of all lost time injuries involved MSDs, amounting to more than 35,000 injured workers.

What will MOL inspectors look for?

Your first concern should be “does your company have a written policy/procedure/program dealing with MSDs”?

In our commitment to be your Health and Safety provider we are well equipped to assist you with this initial step and can also help you with implementation of your program.

Be prepared for this “Spring Blitz”! 

We can help!

For more information on “Blitzes” use our link to the MOL website and search under “blitzes”.