Entries tagged with
OHS
This is the second of two blog posts examining Bill 47. This post focuses on changes to the Workers’ Compensation Act. These changes save employers money by reducing the likelihood of injured workers receiving benefits and reducing the value of those benefits. Bill 47 also makes it harder for workers to appeal decisions and reduces the likelihood of returning to their job once recovered.
Alberta’s United Conservative government recently introduced Bill 47 (Ensuring Safety and Cutting Red Tape Act, 2020). The bill makes substantial changes to the Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) Act and the Workers’ Compensation Act and represents a rollback of workers’ safety protections. This is the first of two blog posts examining Bill 47. This post focuses on changes to the OHS Act that, if passed, will come into effect Sept. 1, 2021.
Two meat-packing plants in southern Alberta have given rise to nearly one in six of Alberta’s 3400 cases of COVID-19. Athabasca University's Bob Barnetson and Jason Foster examine what went wrong at the two meatpacking plants, what it tells us about the inadequacy of OHS policy in Alberta and how the incidents could have been avoided.
Athabasca University labour relations professor Bob Barnetson analyzes the UCP's Bill 26, which repeals many of the gains Alberta farm workers gained with 2015’s Bill 6, adds new exclusions, and strips agricultural workers of many basic employment rights.
Athabasca University labour relations professor Bob Barnetson analyzes the UCP pledge to repeal 2015’s Enhanced Protection for Farm and Ranch Workers Act (more commonly referred to as Bill 6).
Bob Barnetson looks at what WCB data reveals about the impact of mandatory workers’ compensation coverage for paid, non-family farm workers in Alberta.
While the government's new Occupational Health and Safety (OHS) rules affecting paid, non-family farm workers in Alberta represent a significant win for farm worker safety, a number of troubling exceptions will continue to heighten the risk of farm worker injury and death.
Labour relations professor Bob Barnetson explains why new rules regulating youth employment introduced as part of the Alberta government's sweeping update to employment standards could make a bad situation even worse for young workers.
Vast majority of Alberta workplace injuries not reported
Study finds roughly one in five workers hurt at work
As workers across the province prepare to mark the April 28 Day of Mourning for workers killed, injured, and disabled on the job, a new report from the University of Alberta’s Parkland Institute suggests that official statistics are radically underestimating the scale of workplace injury in the province.
Safer by Design
How Alberta Can Improve Workplace Safety
Based on a survey of 2,000 Alberta workers, this report looks at the failure of the occupational health and safety system to keep workers in the province safe, and makes recommendations to reduce the number of occupational fatalities, injuries, and illnesses.