After one of the most dangerous years in the city’s construction history, Calgary’s manager of building regulations has called on Alberta provincial officials to increase fines significantly for those companies found guilty of safety-code violations especially those, such as failing to secure building materials, that not only endanger workers, but the public at large.  He notes that the maximum $15,000 penalty for potentially deadly violations is significantly lower than for breaches of other safety laws, and doesn’t reflect the seriousness of the incidents.

This call comes in the wake of a series of incidents of falling debris that have occurred in the last year at high rise construction sites throughout Calgary, including falling steel that killed 3-year-old Michelle Krsek and injured an uncle last August.

The latest case being investigated by the city involves an online video, recorded last October but just recently discovered and passed on to authorities that was forwarded to city authorities, depicting construction workers with Skyway Canada horsing around recklessly on a Beltline tower. In the video (which has been removed from the YouTube video site), one worker actually tosses a metal clamp across scaffolds and jokes about the potential disaster if the tool had fallen and struck a passer-by. After learning of the video, Skyway Canada suspended two of the workers seen in the video. A third worker visible in the video had already left the company.

In addition to increased fines, city officials would also like to see greater reporting of incidents to the city. Currently, when near-misses or injuries occur, companies are required to report to the provincial Occupational Health and Safety office, but not to the city.  The city would like to see mandatory reporting to the city. The Calgary city council doesn’t have the legal authority to require such a thing, so the city is currently forced to rely on a voluntary reporting program for the city’s construction industry.

Veridian Corporation, the seventh largest municipal electric company in Ontario, which provides services to more than 110,000 customers, has announced that the company has now amassed 2.5 million hours worked without a lost-time injury. This number was achieved over eight years of work by its workforce of more than 200 employees. In that time, not one job-related injury occurred that was serious enough to result in an employee not being able to return to work.

The company credits its employees and managers for establishing a work culture in which safety comes first. They also give credit to the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW) union, as well as the company’s Joint Health and Safety Committees for the incredible safety record, by creating a work culture that emphasizes ongoing training, skill development and personal responsibility which, in addition to keeping workers safer and more productive, also creates a basis for improved productivity and innovation.

This is not the first time Veridian’s safety record has been noted. Back in October 2008, the Electrical & Utilities Safety Association (E&USA) recognized Veridian with their prestigious ‘President’s Award’ for safety, even though they had “only” logged 2 million hours worked without a lost time injury at the time.

If your company isn’t paying proper attention to worker safety and training, it is only a matter of time before it costs your business money. But did you know the cost could be a lot more? Consider this case, coming out of the United Kingdom.

Colin Cooper, sole owner and director of IC Roofing Ltd., is about to go on trial for manslaughter for the death of a worker who plunged more than six meters to his death through a skylight in East Sussex. Darren Hoofe was carrying out roofing repairs on behalf of IC Roofing on November 29, 2005, at the Bellbrook Industrial Estate in Uckfield, when he fell onto the factory floor below. He died in hospital the day after the fall from head injuries. An investigation was launched by Sussex Police and the Health and Safety Executive (HSE), and Mr. Cooper was ultimately charged with manslaughter and offences under the Health and Safety at Work Act.

The prosecution is trying to make the case that Cooper “hadn’t correctly assessed the risks” to his employees on the job, and had not taken steps to mitigate the risk.

“He hadn’t correctly assessed the risk to them of injury, let alone the risk to them of death – in particular the risk of falls from height – and he had not devised a safe system of work for what was obviously an inherently high-risk situation,” they said in court papers.

The deceased, Mr. Hoofe, a trained electrical engineer who lived with his parents in Newhaven, was “inexperienced” and had received “limited training” during the six months he had been employed by IC Roofing Ltd. According to prosecutors, in addition to not wearing a safety harness, Hoofe was wearing his own running shoes, rather than proper safety boots at the time of the fall.

If there is any doubt that the safety of workers should be a company’s highest priority, this case should put that to rest. Even if you can survive such a situation financially, are you willing to risk more than that, by not doing all you can to make sure your employees are safe and secure?