Families deserve justice: Flynn
NDP, Unfor, GE Retirees Advisory Committee blast labour minister
Premier Kathleen Wynne’s Liberal government is dragging its feet on a review of 250 denied Workplace Safety and Insurance Board compensation claims by workers at General Electric Peterborough who were exposed to toxic chemicals over four decades, the NDP’s labour critic says.
But Labour Minister Kevin Flynn says the WSIB has formed a dedicated review team that will do nothing but look at GE Peterborough claims.
During Question Period in the Ontario Legislature on Thursday, Welland MPP Cindy Forster called on the government to follow through on its commitments to hundreds of GE Peterborough workers and retirees afflicted by cancer and other severe, lifethreatening illnesses as a result of decades of toxic exposure while on the job.
“It’s unconscionable that the Wynne government continues to stall on ensuring workers and retirees from GE have the benefits they need,” Forster stated. “Not only is the government failing to ensure our compensation system is there when victims of occupational disease need it most but worse, it’s cutting back on funding to the very programs it promised would review these victims’ denied claims.”
Flynn told Forster during Question Period that the GE Peterborough workers and their families deserve better.
“This has been a very, very tough situation for the workers at the GE plant in Peterborough and it has gone on for far too long,” Flynn said.
“This goes back to the 1950s and ‘60s when these people were exposed to chemicals we know a lot more about today. Over the years through multiple governments, their employer, their health clinics, organized labour, the MOL (Ministry of Labour), the WSIB should have stepped up and helped these people. Simply put, they did not.
“What we are doing in a very short period of time is attempting to rectify the situation. These families deserve justice. They haven’t had the justice they deserve. We are putting in place, we’ve just announced from the WSIB, a dedicated review that that’s going to do nothing but look at claims coming out from the GE plant in Peterborough. I’m determined to get these people the justice they deserve and I promise that that will happen.”
But Forster responded that the government has been placing the burden of proof on the claimants.
“The member is right, these workers and their families deserve better. That is exactly what we are working to. We don’t need any lastminute press releases and lastminute press conferences telling us something we already knew,” Flynn replied to Forster.
“We need to put a system in place. As I said, we put in a dedicated team at the WSIB -- that’s all they do. They look at claims from GE in an expedited manner to make sure these folks get the justice they should have gotten a long time ago. It’s an important step forward.
“I’ve met with the families on a regular basis. I understand their arguments and I’m trying to do something about their argument.”