Injured Workers' Day 2013

Injured Workers and Their Allies Demand Justice

- Jim Nugent -

June 5, 2013 - Hundreds of injured workers and their allies rallied at the Ontario Legislature on June 1 to demand justice for injured workers and for the families of workers who have been killed on the job. The action was organized to mark Injured Workers' Day. The rally expressed the determination of the working class to never accept employers and government trampling on the right of workers and their families to just compensation when they are injured or killed on the job. Workers stood together and said No! to the impoverishment and marginalization of injured workers.

This was the thirtieth year Injured Workers' Day actions have been organized at Queen's Park. June 1 is the anniversary of the action by three thousand injured workers at Queen's Park on June 1, 1983 which was the culmination of a province-wide mobilization in support of the rights of injured workers, which blocked legislation for anti-worker changes to the workers' compensation system, put forward by the government at the time.

The rally this year was organized in the conditions of a nationwide anti-worker offensive of the rich which includes intense pressure to dismantle the workers' compensation systems. Actions of injured workers' organizations such as those organized in Ontario on Injured Workers' Day are a key front in the resistance of the Canadian working class to the all-out assault on workers' rights by the ruling elite and their political representatives.

The Injured Workers' Day events at Queen's Park were organized by the Ontario Network of Injured Workers Groups (ONIWG) and allied organizations. Injured workers and activists from injured workers' organizations across the province attended, including delegates from as far away as Thunder Bay and Ottawa. Members of injured workers' groups from Toronto, Hamilton and other cities in southern Ontario attended in large numbers. Some of the new injured workers' groups being formed in response to the stepped-up attacks on injured workers by the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) participated in Injured Workers' Day events for the first time, including the St. Catharine's Injured Workers Group and the Niagara Falls Injured Workers Group.

Prominent among the union delegations supporting the action were the steelworkers of Local 1005  USW. The Local 1005 delegation included injured, retired and active steelworkers. Other union organizations represented in the action include the Ontario Federation of Labour (OFL), Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU), United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW), the United Steelworkers Toronto Area Council, the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) Local 707 (Oakville) and the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Local 1750, which represents WSIB employees.

All of the speakers representing workers' organizations said the struggle for just compensation is a fight for all workers in Ontario. They pledged to put the full weight of their organizations behind the resistance of injured workers to the dismantling of the compensation system.

Throughout the rally songs and drama were used to convey information about the injured workers' struggles. One of the themes of the rally this year was the working class' opposition to the anti-social retrogression the privileged minority with political power is trying to impose on the whole society. This is expressed by injured workers' organizations as defence of what are known as the Meredith Principles that underlie workers' compensation systems in Canada. At the rally, defence of the Meredith Principles was the content of songs and skits, complete with elaborate costumes and brilliant props and a theme of many of the speeches given by the representatives of injured workers' organizations and their allies.

In 1913 a commission headed by Justice Meredith outlined the principles that became known as the Meredith Principles which reflected a social consensus that it was immoral and unacceptable in a modern society for employers to throw injured workers onto the street to fend for themselves. It outlined a government-operated social program for workers to be entirely funded collectively by employers. The program would be a no-fault system providing full compensation and medical support for workers injured or killed on the job.

Today injured workers are fighting attempts by employers and governments to turn back the clock, dismantling this social program that was designed to protect workers, turning it into a low-cost insurance scheme that serves employers. Injured workers expressed their determination to block employers and their political representatives from pushing through this anti-social and immoral retrogression.

Another feature of the rally was the direct participation of injured workers. Many workers described the inhuman practices used by WSIB to deny and suppress claims and how this is driving them and their families into poverty. They also expressed their determination to never give up their demands for just compensation.

One of the injured workers who spoke was Kostas Purlanis, who was part of the big mobilization of injured workers at Queen's Park on June 1, 1983 and who has returned every year since for Injured Workers' Day. He shared with younger workers his experience over these 30 years of the deception of injured workers by governments of the NDP, Liberal and Conservative parties. "They are all partners working against injured workers," he said. "I tell you from my heart, they are all liars. They promise and promise -- that's all they have for working people."

A high point of the event was the distribution of the third edition of the newspaper, Justice For Injured Workers, published by the Ontario Network of Injured Workers Groups with the support of Voice of Steel Productions. Injured workers circulated through the crowd proudly distributing copies of the newspaper, full of confidence that they are finding a way to break the silence about their struggle for justice and to end their marginalization.

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