Monday, November 11, 2024
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Ontario launches construction death review committee to enhance worker safety, speed up investigations

 

Michael Lewis

Special to Ontario Construction News

Ontario’s newly formed construction death review advisory committee will include management and labour appointees who will examine clusters of job site fatalities to begin the work early next year of clearing a backlog of 137 cases that had been slated for coroner’s inquests.

The 11-member committee, made up of three labour and three employer members, along with health and safety organizations and a representative of Threads of Life, a Canadian charity dedicated to supporting families after a workplace fatality, will prioritize older cases as well as those where family participation is expected.

The older fatalities, with some occurring more than a decade ago, will be grouped with current cases where similarities exist, union committee members told Ontario Construction News. The committee intends to release its first annual public report in June 2026.

Sean McFarling, LiUNA general counsel who is among the labour appointees on the committee, said the new format will replace mandatory inquests that aim to establish cause in a quasi-judicial setting.

He said the new approach is better suited to the task since it allows for an overview to identify commonalities across critical injury incidents while expediting the process.

The new format will feature an advisory committee with expertise in construction and occupational health and safety rather than lay members of a coroner’s jury, although revisions to the Coroners Act still allow for an inquest upon a family request or if an inquest is deemed to be in the public interest.

The Christmas Eve swing stage collapse in Toronto that killed four migrant workers is an example of an incident where an inquest might serve the public interest, McFarling said. It took more than 12 years after the 2009 tragedy for the inquest to take place.

The review committee format “allows us to go a little bit deeper,” said Carmine Tiano, director of occupational services at the Provincial Building and Construction Trades Council, whose membership includes 16 affiliated construction craft unions.

“It allows us to get into the nitty gritty of the deaths before the civil and criminal litigation is disposed of, so we don’t have to wait five or six years.

“I think this is a win-win for families and the industry,” said Tiano, who along with McFarling and a member from the Union of Operating Engineers training centre make up the labour component of the advisory committee. Employer groups on the committee did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Shirley Hickman, Threads of Life executive director, said the Coroner’s Office reached out to individuals and families directly affected by workplace tragedies early on in its planning for the new approach and “we have been honoured to be part of these discussions.

“For us, the key priorities are that family members have a voice in the inquest or review process, are kept informed about the process, and that the investigation and review happen in a timely manner,” she said, noting that the group has accepted an invitation to be part of the advisory committee. “We support the coroner’s efforts to make these reviews more timely and meaningful.”

As construction workplace fatalities remain stubbornly high and amid a spike in fall from heights construction fatalities at residential and other construction sites in the GTA, the province in April launched an inspection blitz across Ontario construction workplaces.

The inspections are to continue through the end of March to identify and address hazards related to vehicles, equipment, and materials.

As well, Ontario’s Chief Prevention Officer is leading a review of the causes of critical injuries and fatalities in the construction sector and has initiated a consultation on expanding the types of health and safety equipment to be provided on construction projects.

The ministry is “currently analyzing feedback received,” said a spokesperson for the Ontario Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development.

The Office of the Chief Coroner, meanwhile, says the final Construction Death Review Process in place of mandatory inquests into construction workplace deaths will be ready later this year. with work to begin on implementation in early 2025

Stephanie Rea, issues manager with the OCC, said the office received 17 “significant” written submissions from stakeholders with working sessions to discuss the final details of the review taking place over the summer.

The province in 2023 unveiled an overhaul of the Coroners Act to replace mandatory inquests with reviews of groups of similar deaths and public reports on the reviews to be published every June. It said the changes are meant to speed up the system to get answers sooner.

Opposition critics, however, say inquests offer an unequaled level of detailed examination, suggesting that inquests could proceed far more quickly if the province dropped requirements that legal proceedings related to construction fatalities be exhausted before an inquest is scheduled.

They also argue that coroner’s inquest recommendations have been routinely ignored, though Tiano said many of the recommendations from the non-expert jurors could not be practically implemented. The Ontario Federation of Labour, for its part, has called for a more vigorous use of the Criminal Code to enforce worker protection.

Workplace Safety and Insurance Board Ontario statistics show construction fatalities in Ontario have declined gradually over the past few years within a narrow range even as construction activity increased. Lost-time injuries in the sector have moved lower, also in a narrow band, from 5,917 in 2021 to 5,742 in 2022 and 5,141 in 2023,

“Given all of the work that’s been done they haven’t gone up, but they haven’t really gone down,” Tiano said. “Twenty lives lost every year from the same basically four contraventions” (led by falling from heights and struck by equipment.)

“It’s like flying on an airline that says ‘hey, we only have four crashes a year; we don’t go above.’”

He said preventing deaths on construction sites requires a multifaceted approach — better training for small independent roofers, greater oversight of the underground construction economy with home insurance policies more explicitly indicating that they will be void if worker safety procedures are not followed, as well as greater attention to hazard assessment and less willingness to compromise safety to meet tight building deadlines.

Technology, such as drones that can reduce the need for ascending to heights and AI to tabulate data on construction fatalities across North America also hold promise.

He said mandatory drug testing may be needed in some sectors of the construction industry if less intrusive methods prove ineffective.

Tiano also singled out temporary employment agencies who take advantage of unskilled refugees who can unwittingly find themselves on hazardous jobs sites.

“Legitimate temp agencies no problem; the ones that are exploiting people in the community, who are exploiting refugees for their physical labour, they’re a problem.”

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