If the new regulations for off-road engines are approved by the Metro Vancouver board at the end of this month , they will be the first of their kind in Canada. The rules are intended to represent a major new step to improving air quality and the health of local residents.

Older machines with Tier 0 engines, including excavators, backhoes, forklifts and loaders with pre-1996 engines, are considered  the most polluting, and will see annual fees starting at $4 per horsepower beginning in 2012, with fees climbing to $20 by 2017, if it isn’t either  retrofitted or re-powered. Tier 1 engines will pay the same fees, but not until 2014. Cleaner Tier 2, Tier 3 and Tier 4 engines will be exempt.

Officials claim the fee scheme is not about penalizing businesses, it’s about encouraging businesses to upgrade their machines. As an extra incentive to clean up, operators who upgrade to a higher standard will receive a refund of as much as 80% of all fees paid in the previous three years.

According to advocacy groups, retrofitting an engine with a filter can cut 95 per cent of the particulates spewed out in emissions, and new diesel engines release just one per cent as much particulate as the old ones.

Ships and trucks are bigger sources of diesel emissions, but officials worry more about the health impacts of off-road machinery, because they operate in one place, and often operate much closer to residents.

The provincial government is considering a $58-million loan guarantee to the Indian consortium, which is led by Balcorp Inc. The lure of jobs in a down economy is cited as a major reason for even contemplating the deal. The Quebec government is considering paying for routine inspections in India to make sure the asbestos is used safely.

The Rideau Institute, however, believes it would be impossible to regulate safe use of asbestos throughout India because of the generally poor working conditions in that country. For example, when asbestos cement products are dispersed, they will end up in thousands and thousands of poor villages and slums.

The Institute also objects to the fact that Quebec’s Commission de la santé et de la sécurité du travail du Québec (CSST), their workplace health and safety board, is part of an economic mission to India next week to promote the safe use of asbestos. They say the Quebec government should not be helping to export asbestos to India, or anywhere else, for that matter.

In fact, there were so much concern expressed by members of the NWT Construction Association and the NWT Chamber of Commerce, that the Workers’ Safety & Compensation Commission (WSCC) of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut announced an extension of the public consultation period for the OHSR to March 31, a full five months later than had originally been scheduled.  It is hoped that the extension will give businesses time to examine the proposed regulations and provide meaningful feedback to the Safety Regulation Review Committee.

The WSCC and the two territorial governments studied the regulatory framework under the current Safety Acts and found it to be “fragmented, outdated, unclear and difficult to enforce,” according to a WSCC press release. The review committee spent two years developing the draft OHSR, which would replace all regulations under the Safety Acts, including the integration of regulations related to asbestos, workplace smoking, silica and soundblasting, among others, and combine them all into a single set of regulations.

Among some of the other changes included in the draft regulations are:

• Creating an enhanced role for joint occupational health and safety committees;
• Facilitating a partnership between employers and workers for greater safety at work sites;
• Facilitating a greater use of practice guidelines, standards and codes, with employers, workers and other stakeholders taking a much greater role in their development;
• Updating requirements for personal protective equipment;
• More directly addressing unique safety issues for workers in extremely cold weather;
• More provisions for radiation safety, including protection of pregnant workers and;
• More regulations dealing with harassment and violence on the job;

Some business groups, however, have complained about what they refer to as the WSCC’s “misguided approach” to developing the new regulations. They point out that a rewrite of the rules doesn’t necessarily lead to improved safety performance in the workplace.

Some have also expressed concern over the size of the draft, which runs approximately 350 pages, which seems excessive to some. In a business climate in which 97% of businesses fit into the “small” category, they wonder how many business owners will read the whole thing and recognize the regulations that apply to them. They worry about the “one-size-fits-all” nature of the new regulations, their lack of a risk assessment component. There are also cost concerns about regulations relating to internal safety committees, additional training and the shutting down of sites if the combined temperature and wind chill drops to -45 C or lower.  A few businesses indicated that they might as well shut down for the winter under such conditions.

For their part, the WSCC acknowledges the media attention they’ve received over the cold weather regulations, and they are sensitive to many other concerns, as well. When the current consultation period ends, they will decide if more consultation is necessary. They hope to put the new regulations in effect by the spring or summer of 2012.

Apparently, the 30-year-old worker, Diego Herrera, was wearing a safety harness, but that harness was unattached  when he fell through what the report describes as a “mouse hole” in the sails.

An inspection report taken at the work site also noted a number of violations of safety regulations at the work site, including ropes, straps, webbing, electrical cords and construction debris around the mouse hole in violation of the Occupational Health and Safety Regulation. The report made it clear that there were grounds for imposing an administrative penalty against Birdair Inc. of Amherst, N.Y, the company that was hired to replace the sails at Canada Place by Ledcor Construction Ltd., which is managing the project on behalf of Canada Place Corporation.

The report read, “The employer did not have a fall protection plan for the sealing up of the mouse hole. The mouse hole was not guarded or guard-railed. The area in front of the mouse hole had many slip and trip hazards.”

No further action will be taken, however, until WorkSafeBC’s investigation of the incident is complete.

WorkSafeBC regulations stipulate that an employer must have a fall protection system in place when work is being done at heights of 3 metres or more. The $21-million project to replace the sails — originally erected in 1984 — began in July 2010 and is expected to be completed later this year.

Police received a call at about 1:10 pm, reporting an injured construction worker at a condominium construction site in Oakville.  The 31-year-old worker, an employee of EDVAC Contracting Ltd, based in Brampton, Ontario, was standing on the ground when a 3.5-metre aluminum beam, weighing approximately 30 kilograms, fell over a safety fence, plummeted eight stories and struck the worker on his head, face and right shoulder.  Emergency personnel and doctors agree that that only thing that prevented the head trauma from being more severe was his hard hat.

The worker was immediately transported to Hamilton General Hospital, where he was listed in serious but stable condition. The Ministry of Labour (MoL) immediately secured the construction site pending an investigation.

EDVAC Contracting was issued one order: to develop and implement a procedure for placing formwork that will ensure that beams cannot fall from the building. Two orders were issued to the constructor of the site, Toronto-based Dominus Construction. One order was to provide employment records for the injured worker and witness reports to the ministry; and the other was to develop and implement a procedure to eliminate workers’ exposure to overhead hazards.

The investigation into the incident continues.

The get-together was co-hosted by the Honourable Lisa Raitt, Canada’s Labour Minister, and the Honourable Jennifer Howard, Minister of Labour and Immigration for Manitoba.

Minister Raitt asserted that the Canadian Government’s top priority was the economy and that “safe and healthy workplaces boost productivity and innovation,” and that “the well-being of workers and employers are key to the success and performance of Canada’s economy.”

According to Minister Howard, “Safe and healthy working environments do not just happen, they require a commitment by governments and everyone at the workplace. … Manitoba has long enjoyed a reputation as a leader in workplace health and safety issues and we want to continue to build on our successes.”

The meeting included discussions of Canada’s international labour activities, and endorsed a renewed strategy for Canada’s work as part of the International Labour Organization. They agreed to work together to develop programs that use social media and other tools to enhance the occupational health and safety of young workers.  They also participated in panel discussions regarding the evolution of work and possible long-range labor policy, with an emphasis on labour relations, employment standards, and mental health in the workplace.

The labour ministers’ meeting is an annual event, but ongoing work continues throughout the year, through the Canadian Association of Administrators of Labour Legislation (CAALL). Established in 1938, CAALL is an association of federal-provincial-territorial departments of labour and heads of occupational health and safety agencies.

The new system is fully mobile, consisting of a wheeled unit, which is pulled by a standard truck tractor. The unit can be deployed relatively quickly and, because of its reversible axles, it can easily be reconfigured for either right or left applications in about half an hour.

These new mobile units, which are bright orange to alert drivers that road work is taking place, reduce the need for road crews to set up a Temporary Concrete Barrier (TCB), which means they can finish road work and reopen a lane in less time.  By adding panels, the size of the work zone can be expanded to as much as 31 metres, and the systems are also customizable, including such options as portable message signs, auxiliary lighting and a privacy barrier. The unit meets U.S. National Cooperative Highway Research Program 350 TL-3 crash test requirements, as well.

The mobile work zone barriers increase the safety of maintenance and construction crews, according to a number of test projects, and past use by others. The state of California has been deploying such mobile barriers since 2004, for example, and they have proven to be very time effective and safe. California refers to its mobile barriers as “Balsi Beams,” because they were developed after worker Mark Balsi was killed by a motorist while picking up trash along the highway. California’s Balsi Beam was among those demonstrated to MTO officials at a conference several years ago, which led to last summer’s trial.

Construction crews have so far found it easy to adapt to the devices, and feel very confident working behind them.  The Highway 115 trial project proved the units to be so effective that the contractor’s schedule was advanced, and work was completed ahead of time, because they were able to eliminate the work necessary in placing and removing the TCB.

Due to the success of the initial mobile barrier trial, MTO expects to expand their use for projects such as pothole filling, pavement testing, crack sealing, bridge and guide rail repairs, and even accident scene investigations.

Photos of the mobile work zone barrier system in action can be found here.

The smoke in some areas has been quite intense, and has at times drifted far enough east that Edmonton and Calgary have been forced to call smoke advisories. Workers throughout the province, especially those working close to the affected areas, have suffered from headaches, respiratory issues, sore throats and upset stomachs. There have also been cases in which loggers have suffered near-misses, because they could not see machinery up ahead due to poor visibility, and several contractors have watched as machines burned up in the fire.

The British Columbia Ministry of Forests and Range has recommended voluntary shutdowns or going to night hauling to take advantage of cooler temperatures, but that doesn’t address the issue of smoke, so a large number of companies remain shut down completely, and have no idea when they can resume operations, and do so safely.

Dueck became paralyzed from the waist down in a workplace accident at the age of 23. Since then, he has become a world-champion para-alpine skier. He has won national and international competitions and recently won a silver medal at the 2010 Paralympics Winter Games. And as a member of the WorkSafeBC Paralympics Speaker program, he has shared his experiences with youth across British Columbia for the past several years.

Since 2007,  the Raise Your Hand campaign has used its website at RaiseYourHand.com, street teams that travel to high schools and universities around the province, and other means to raise awareness about workplace safety to the province’s 350,000 young workers.

The good news is that such accidents are commonly caused by circumstances such as untidy work spaces, spillages on floors, uneven floors, obstructions, bad lighting and other things that are relatively easy to fix. Therefore, if regular workplace inspections occur, employers could potentially find these problems and effectively prevent future accidents, thus saving everyone a lot of money.

Workplace accidents caused an estimated 4.7 million sick days in Scotland alone last year, and most of them began as slips, trips and falls and not serious injuries, but resulted in employees seeking workers compensation for bad injuries that could been avoided.

Construction sites are among the workplaces most susceptible to slips, trips and falls. Part of the problem is that building sites naturally provide a number of risks and safety hazards to employees not associated with other professions.