Release of report on elevators delayed

The Ontario government is delaying the release of a consultancy report on elevators commissioned by the province’s safety authority last spring and delivered in November while it puts together a response. While the Liberal government initially said it was up to the safety organization to release the analysis of elevator reliability, it now says that won’t happen for several more weeks.

“We are currently reviewing the report and considering next steps to improve elevator availability in Ontario,” Barbara Hanson, with the Ministry of Government Consumer Services, said this week.

In April last year, the government ordered the arm’s-length Technical Standards and Safety Authority to commission a study amid concern about growing issues with out-ofservice elevators in a society increasingly dependent on them. A private member’s bill from Liberal backbencher Han Dong that among other things would mandate time limits for getting defective lifts operational received widespread political support but drew the wrath of the dominant industry players.

In response, the authority contracted with Deloitte to do the study — led by retired justice Douglas Cunningham — with an October deadline. As Cunningham prepared to finalize the report, the country’s four main elevator companies, alarmed by Dong’s bill and other proposed measures, produced their own report that cast a wide net of blame for “real and perceived” problems with the industry.

Cunningham went back and revised the report to reflect those concerns but the safety authority known as the TSSA had a final version in early November.