Seeking justice for fallen workers

It was a scene of twisted steel and carnage. Two bricklayers were killed on March 27 when a massive hydraulic scaffold — sometimes called a mastclimber — plunged five storeys at a condo development in Toronto’s west end. In another fatal accident just days ago, a worker fell five metres from a construction site in Toronto’s financial district.

These chilling tragedies dominate local headlines for the day and leave construction workers and their families in a state of shock. But there is never a parade in their honour, no flags are lowered and there is often little political hand-wringing in the legislature.

These incidents are eerily reminiscent of an Etobicoke swing stage collapse on Dec. 24, 2009, that killed four workers and left a fifth with life-altering injuries. Only one worker on the platform survived the ordeal unscathed — he was the only one connected to a lifeline.

Sadly, tragedies like these occur with alarming regularity and, too often, they are marked by private sorrow rather than public outrage.

An average of 80 workers die horribly each year in traumatic on-the-job accidents, another 200 die a slow, agonizing death from occupational diseases and over 200,000 more are maimed at work. Between 2008 and 2013, there was an alarming 36-per-cent increase in work- place fatalities.

Every April 28, workers across the country pay tribute to their fallen co-workers at solemn ceremonies to commemorate the “Day of Mourning for Workers Killed or Injured on the Job.” This day was officially recognized in Canada almost 30 years ago, yet today workers’ deaths continue to go largely unrecognized — except by the surviving family, friends and colleagues.

It isn’t enough to mourn for the dead; we must also fight for the living.

It has been 11 years since labour unions won historic changes to the Criminal Code that made it possible to convict employers for criminal negligence causing workplace tragedies and, to date, not one has served a prison sentence. The law was changed in the wake of the Westray Mine disaster of 1992 that claimed the lives of 26 miners in Nova Scotia, and it came into effect in 2004.

While many companies receive government fines for fatal health and safety violations, all too often local police and Crown attorneys are not trained to view these accidents as potential crime scenes. To add insult to injury, an audit of Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board payouts last year revealed that the employer-subsidized agency is rebating millions of dollars in premiums every year to companies that have been found guilty of fatal safety violations.

The labour movement is seeking to find justice for these fallen workers.

After the Christmas Eve tragedy in 2009, the Ontario Federation of Labour launched a “Kill a Worker, Go to Jail” campaign to demand police investigations into fatal workplace incidents and prison sentences for employers found guilty of criminal negligence causing injury or death.

Three years later, Metron Construction was finally convicted of criminal negligence causing the Etobicoke deaths. It was Ontario’s first conviction under the Westray provisions in the Criminal Code. The company was awarded the highest fine in Canadian history for a workplace death, but the company’s owner escaped personal prosecution.

Today, workers are left clinging to the hope that the on-site project manager might yet be sentenced to actual jail time.

It is too soon to speculate as to the cause or preventability of the recent deaths that rocked Toronto’s construction industry. However, these deaths — and the others that will be remembered on April 28 — are grim reminders that every worker who is killed on the job deserves the full attention of the law. Their families deserve to know the police have done more than rule out foul play, that they have investigated employer negligence as a possible cause.

After all, when criminal negligence results in a worker’s death, it is a crime, not an accident.

Victims and their families waited 20 years to see an Ontario company fined in a criminal court for killing workers; they cannot wait another 20 years to see the bosses who make the tragic decisions go to jail.

Ontario’s justice system must send a clear message to CEOs and managers that they cannot simply chalk workers’ lives up to the cost of doing business. Otherwise, more Ontario workers will continue to die each year in preventable workplace tragedies.