Rubber workers’ claims to be reviewed
WSIB chair Elizabeth Witmer ‘very concerned’ about former employees from Kitchener’s rubber industry
KITCHENER — The chair of Ontario’s Workplace Safety and Insurance Board is ordering the provincial agency to review hundreds of denied claims from rubber workers who believe their jobs made them sick.
The review comes after a series of stories by The Record that exposed the health legacy of Kitchener’s rubber industry. Rubber workers have long worried chemicals used in the manufacturing process are linked to elevated rates of cancer and other diseases among co-workers.
Elizabeth Witmer, the former Kitchener-Waterloo MPP who now chairs the compensation board, said she’s troubled by the cases of rubber workers who’ve developed cancer or died because of what many believe was toxic exposure in their workplaces.
“My heart goes out to those working men and women who truly have suffered,” she said.
“I have a lot of concern with how the workers and their families have had to deal with working in those plants . ... I’m very concerned, and that’s why I’ve asked for a review of the situation in Kitchener.”
The WSIB said a “dedicated review team” will re-examine more than 300 claims filed by rubber workers in Waterloo Region since 2002 that had not previously been allowed. The review will focus on chemical exposures with links to specific types of cancer, and cases where a better understanding of the intensity and variety of workplace exposures could impact the decision.
Witmer also urged any former rubber workers who are sick and have never filed an occupational disease claim to get in touch with the WSIB.
The Record’s reporting revealed that only 15 per cent of occupational disease claims filed by rubber workers between 2002 and 2017 were approved for compensation by the WSIB.
In many cases, workers or their surviving families fought the WSIB claims and appeal process for more than a decade only to have their cases rejected.
Witmer said the science around workplace carcinogens and the connection to workers’ health continues to evolve — and that means these claims deserve a second look.
“I’ve ordered that we go back and revisit those cases where there is new science or other information that has come to the table since those claims have come to our attention,” she said.
“And I’ve asked that we would do so in a very open and transparent way.”
Witmer pointed to the precedent of a recent review of claims made by General Electric workers in Peterborough. Of the hundreds of rejected claims the WSIB reviewed in that case, about one-third
were overturned and given compensation.
“There’s no way we can predict the outcome, but we certainly owe it to these people who have suffered, and to the families who have suffered,” she said.
Catherine Fife, MPP for Kitchener-Waterloo, applauded Witmer’s call for a review. She and Kitchener Centre MPP Laura Mae Lindo said they intend to keep the pressure on the WSIB.
“I think this is potentially a positive turn of events for the workers who helped build Kitchener and Waterloo up,” Fife said.
“Our job as MPPs now is to make sure there’s follow-through. But it’s encouraging that Mrs. Witmer has ordered the cases reopened, because they deserve to be reviewed.”
Fife and Lindo say they’ll be meeting with former rubber workers as the review gets underway, to help them navigate the WSIB claim process.
Virginia MacKenzie, whose husband Ross MacKenzie died in 2007 after working for 38 years at the BF Goodrich rubber plant in Kitchener, said the review is overdue.
“It’s about time,” she said. “I’m happy. I just hope they do all the cases they declined, because there’s a lot of people who need help.”
Cancer also claimed MacKenzie’s sixweek-old son and 33-year-old daughter. The WSIB ruled her husband’s illness couldn’t be conclusively linked to his workplace exposure.
“They knew what these chemicals were, but they wouldn’t tell the people,” she said.
Others said they’re optimistic their claims might finally be approved. Gayle Wannan’s husband Lynden Wannan died at age 49 after 26 years at Uniroyal. She spent 12 years fighting the WSIB, only to have her claim rejected in 2015.
“I’m hopeful,” she said. “Even now, I feel so happy inside.”
Witmer said she understands the wor- ries of families who believe a loved one’s job impacted their health. Her father worked in construction and on a dairy farm where she says he was exposed to cleaning and other chemicals, she said.
“A lot of people don’t realize that a lot of the things they did could well have caused them health problems later on,” Witmer said.
“The reality is, people worked under different conditions in years past than they do today. Occupational disease is something we’re going to continue to see.”