4.6 Summary
Returning to our opening vignette, the owner of Metron Construction, scaffold supplier Swing N Scaff, and project manager Vadim Kazenelson were all convicted of offences after the Toronto scaffolding collapse. Metron was fined $750,000 for offences under the Ontario OHS Act. Swing N Scaff was ordered to pay $400,000, also under the OHS Act. In June 2015, Kazenelson was convicted under the Criminal Code for criminal negligence causing death and criminal negligence causing bodily harm. He was sentenced to 3½ years in prison. At the time of writing, both his conviction and his sentence are under appeal. Criminal prosecution is rare in Canada (there have been fewer than 10 since the Westray amendments were enacted in 2004) and so Kazenelson’s conviction is noteworthy.
These convictions may have brought some solace to the families of the four killed workers. Yet, given the number of annual injuries in Canadian workplaces, clearly many hazards—including obvious physical hazards—remain uncontrolled in Canadian workplaces. While this situation may, in part, reflect the fact that some hazards are difficult to identify and control, we also need to be cognizant that employers often have a financial incentive to cut corners on safety.
Discussion Questions
- Why are some physical agents difficult to identify?
- How are noise hazards identified and what are the shortcomings of current approaches to controlling it?
- Why might vibration and noise exposure appear together?
- What are the effects of thermal stress and how can they be prevented?
- How are ionizing and non-ionizing radiation different and in what ways are they both hazards?
- What is the core principle of ergonomics and why have OHS practitioners been slow to adopt it?
Exercises
- Identify three physical hazards present in the workplace.
- Using the process in Chapter 3, assess the risk and prioritize the three hazards.
- Identify engineering, administrative, and PPE controls that would eliminate or reduce the hazards.
- Discuss the pros and cons of each control from both a worker and employer perspective.
Notes:
1 Mehta, D. (2015, January 27). Manager didn’t insist on lifelines, court hears; Scaffold collapse. National Post, p. A8.
2 Wetselaar, S. (2014, December 4). Company fined after Christmas Eve scaffolding tragedy that killed four. Toronto Star.
3 CBC News. (2015, June 26). Vadim Kazenelson found guilty in deadly Toronto scaffolding collapse. CBC News Website, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/vadim-kazenelson-found-guilty-in-deadly-toronto-scaffolding-collapse-1.3128868
4 AWCBC. (2014). National work injury, disease and fatality statistics 2010–2012. Ottawa: Association of Workers’ Compensation Boards of Canada.
5 Barnetson, B., & Foster, J. (2015). If it bleeds it leads.
6 AWCBC. (2014).
7 Hsiaoa, H., & Simeonova, P. (2001). Preventing falls from roofs: A critical review. Ergonomics, 44(5), 537–561; Kemmlert, K., & Lundholm, L. (2001). Slips, trips and falls in different work groups—with reference to age and from a preventive perspective. Applied Ergonomics, 32(2): 149–153; Lipscomb, H., Dale, A. M., Kaskutas, V., Sherman-Voellinger, R., & Evanoff, B. (2008). Challenges in residential fall prevention: Insight from apprentice carpenters. American Journal of Industrial Medicine, 51(1), 60–68.
8 Rivara, F., & Thompson, D. (2000). Prevention of falls in the construction industry: Evidence for program effectiveness. American Journal of Preventive Medicine, 18(4), 23–26.
9 Bentley, T. (2009). The role of latent and active failures in workplace slips, trips and falls: An information processing approach. Applied Ergonomics, 40, 177.
10 Bell, J., et al. (2008). Evaluation of a comprehensive slip, trip and fall prevention programme for hospital employees. Ergonomics, 51(12), 1906–1925.
11 European Agency for Safety and Health at Work. (2003). Gender issues in safety and health at work: A review. Luxembourg: Author.
12 Key, M. M., Henschel, A., Butler, J., Ligo, R. N., Tabershaw, I., & Ede, L. (1977). Occupational Diseases: A guide to their recognition (Rev. ed.). Cincinnati: U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare.
13 Safe Work Australia. (2011). Managing Noise and Preventing Hearing Loss at Work. Canberra: Author.
14 E.g., Groothoff, B. (2006). Proceedings of Acoustics 2005, Australian Acoustics Society: 335–340. http://www.acoustics.asn.au/conference_proceedings/AAS2005/index.htm
15 Passchier-Vermeer, W., & Passchier, W. F. (2000). Noise exposure and public health. Environmental Health Perspectives, 108 (Suppl. 1), 123–131.
16 Based on Alberta Occupational Health and Safety Code, Schedule 3, Table 1.
17 Groothoff, B. (2012). Physical Hazards: Noise and Vibration. In Health and Safety Professionals Alliance, The Core Body of Knowledge for Generalist OHS Professionals. Tullamarine, VIC: Safety Institute of Australia, p. 12.
18 European Agency for Safety and Health at Work. (2003).
19 Health and Safety Executive, Government of Great Britain. (2011). Thermal Comfort. http://www.hse.gov.uk/temperature/thermal/
20 Messing, K. (1998). One-eyed science: Occupational health and women workers. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
21 ACGIH. (2013). Threshold Limit Values for Chemical Substances and Physical Agents and Biological Exposure Indices. Cincinnati: ACGIH.
22 Quoted in Storey, R. (2005). Activism and the making of occupational health and safety law in Ontario, 1960s–1980. Policy and Practice in Health and Safety, 3(1), 48.
23 Quoted in Lopez-Pacheco, A. (2014). The strike that saved lives. CIM Magazine (June/July), 34.
24 Frei, P., Poulsen, A. H., Johansen, C., Olsen, J. H., Steding-Jessen, M., & Schüz, J. (2011). Use of mobile phones and risk of brain tumours: Update of Danish cohort study. British Medical Journal, 343:d6387, 1–9; Cardis, E., Richardson, L., Deltour, I., et al. (2007). The INTERPHONE study: Design, epidemiological methods, and description of the study population. European Journal of Epidemiology, 22(9), 647–664.
25 National Cancer Institute. (2013). Cell phones and cancer risk. http://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/radiation/cell-phones-fact-sheet
26 Coureau, G., Bouvier, G., Lebailly, P., et al. (2014). Mobile phone use and brain tumours in the CERENAT case-control study. Occupational & Environmental Medicine, 71(7), 514–522. doi: 10.1136/oemed-2013-101754. Morgan, L. L., Kesari, S., & Davis, D. (2014). Why children absorb more microwave radiation than adults: The consequences. Journal of Microscopy and Ultrastructure, 2(4), 197–204.
27 IARC. (2015). “Preamble.” In IARC Monographs on the Evaluation of Carcinogenic Risks to Humans. Lyon, France: IARC, p. 23.
28 EMFScientist.org. (2015). International Appeal: Scientists Call for Protection from Non-ionizing Electromagnetic Field Exposure, p. 1. https://emfscientist.org/index.php/emf-scientist-appeal
29 Helliwell, P., & Taylor, W. (2004). Repetitive strain injury. Postgraduate Medical Journal, 80, 438–443.
30 Schlosser, E. (2001). The chain never stops. Mother Jones, 26(4). http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2001/07/dangerous-meatpacking-jobs-eric-schlosser
31 Piedrahita, H., Punnett, L., & Shahnavaz, H. (2004). Musculoskeletal symptoms in cold exposed and non-cold exposed workers. International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 34(4), 271–278.
32 Schlosser, E. (2001). The chain never stops.
33 Cummins, H. J. (1992, January 26). Scanners add up injuries for grocery checkout clerks. Seattle Times. http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19920126&slug=1472135
