Last week I wrote about the Ontario government’s plan to amend the Occupational Health and Safety Act to increase the maximum fine against corporations to $1.5 million per charge and against individuals – such as workers, supervisors and corporate directors – to $100,000 per charge.
Schedule 30 to Bill 177 would also amend the OHSA to impose a requirement on employers who do not own the workplace (such as employers who rent or lease all or part of the building or facility in which the employees work), to notify the Ministry of Labour if the joint health and safety committee or a health and safety representative has “identified potential structural inadequacies of a building, structure, or any part thereof, or any other part of a workplace, whether temporary or permanent, as a source of danger or hazard to workers”. This provision appears to be in response to the tragic mall collapse in Elliot Lake, Ontario in 2012.
The Bill would also allow the government to make a regulation requiring employers other than constructors or mining companies to notify the MOL if certain events, described in the applicable regulations, take place. In addition, the Bill would allow the government to make regulations that impose expanded accident reporting obligations on all employers under sections 51, 52 and 53 of the OHSA.
Lastly, the Bill gives the Deputy Minister of Labour authority to “establish written directives for use by inspectors respecting the interpretation, administration and enforcement of this Act and the regulations” which must be “consistent” with the OHSA and regulations and which MOL inspectors are required to follow. Interestingly, the Bill would not require employers to comply with those written directives, which would seem to permit employers to legally challenge the correctness of any interpretation set out in a written directive. We will have to wait to see what these written directives will look like.
