Broad Rejection of Government's Attacks
on Injured Workers

The following are excerpts from recent submissions and letters to Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) Chair Elizabeth Witmer, Premier Kathleen Wynne, MPPs and the leaders of parties in the Legislature demanding that the WSIB scrap the 2014 draft policies!

The Ontario Network of Injured Workers' Groups (ONIWG)

An open letter to Premier Wynne from the Ontario Network of Injured Workers' Groups (ONIWG) calls on the Premier to "stop the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) from changing the law governing workers' compensation in Ontario by way of internal policy change. Changing the law should be done by the Ontario Legislature and our elected representatives, not the institution charged with following the law, the WSIB. The usurpation of power undertaken by the WSIB is a 'scandal' that your government should be aware of and stop before it adversely affects this province.

"The proposed Benefit Policy review changes the foundation of the Act that has been in place since Sir William Meredith created the modern workers compensation system 100 years ago. It is a massive and illegal attack on the rights of the injured workers of Ontario. Instead of a fair Ontario, which you promised, we are witnessing a virtual 'coup', happening under your watch, where an arms-length agency is attempting to change the law under the guise of 'updating' internal policies.

"Ontario elected your government to make the laws of our province. Unelected bureaucrats, like Mr. I. David Marshall, President and CEO of the WSIB, should follow the law, instead of changing the law, as if the WSIB were the government of Ontario. [...]

" [T]hese changes are already in place and, once illegally codified into WSIB policy, the Appeals Tribunal will be bound by them. This will result in injured workers being denied justice and becoming more reliant on social assistance, food banks, OHIP and so on. This is in direct contravention of your government concern about poverty reduction and the historic compromise, in which workers gave up their right to sue in return for fair and just compensation for as long as the disability lasts.

"The Benefit Policies will also introduce a massive intrusion into the private life of injured workers. The new focus will be on what happened before, not after, the injury. This will produce a massive intrusion into private medical records. Even before the policy change, we are already seeing workers who seek compensation for psychiatric conditions, being routinely asked to release all medical records for five years before the injury. This is in line with the most intrusive and socially backward legislation in states such as Alabama, Texas and Arizona. It is as though Tim Hudak were in charge of the WSIB, with his sympathy for the social policies of the regressive 'right to work' US states.

"We want to alert you, Premier Wynne that what is happening is not only a legal scandal, it is also a moral scandal. Under the leadership of Dalton McGuinty, the Government hired Mr. David Marshall with an explicit bonus attached to his 'success' in reducing the WSIB's unfunded liability. We do not know of any other previous President of the WSIB, with an incentive directly connected to benefit reductions to injured workers. Injured workers are offended by this bonus. The WSIB should be fair, and should be seen to be fair. Instead, the bonus structure of its President compromises the Board and the Government that hired him."

Explicit Attack on Rights of Injured Workers

Four lawyers who have practiced workers' compensation law for a collective 134 years call for the draft policies to be abandoned in a letter to the Premier. They state that it is a matter of record that the WSIB has been illegally adjudicating the claims of injured workers largely according to the draft benefit policies for the past four years, as the draft policies are contrary to the law as set out in the Workplace Safety and Insurance Act, existing operational policies and a long history of decision making at both the WSIB and the Workplace Safety and Insurance Appeals Tribunal. They say that "no workers' compensation policies have ever been such an explicit attack on the rights of injured workers in all of the years since the Meredith principles and the workers' compensation system were established 100 years ago."

They point out that the WSIB asserts that the mere presence of even an asymptomatic pre-existing condition is evidence that an injury is not work-related and that benefits can be terminated even if the injured worker continues to suffer from a work-related injury/disease causing functional impairment.

Action outside WSIB offices in London, April 11, 2014. (Occupy WSIB)

United Steelworkers Injured Workers Program

The United Steelworkers Injured Workers Program, a project of the Steelworkers Toronto Area Council, in a letter to the Premier explains that the draft benefits policies allow the WSIB to cut benefits simply because a person has aged.

They say: "When WSIB turns its back on injured workers, Return to Work Services are withdrawn and employers are no longer pressured to accommodate persons with disabilities. Grievance procedures are in place in unionized workplaces to ensure OHRC [Ontario Human Rights Commission] compliance, but if an injured worker is on their own and receiving social assistance, they do not have the resources to fight the discrimination. Further, when the Board ends entitlement to health care benefits, the cost burden of treating injured workers is downloaded to the (OHIP) [Ontario Health Insurance Plan] rather than employer-funded WSIB."

"Put these Damaging Changes Aside" Says CUPE

In a letter to the WSIB Chair Elizabeth Witmer, the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) states that they are opposed to the draft benefits policies which propose to blame workers' disabilities on pre-existing conditions rather than what happens to them at work. CUPE explains its involvement in the tragic situations facing many workers who are not covered by WSIB, in which employers have been let off the hook. They have launched the "WSIB Cover Me" campaign. The campaign exposes the pro-employer situation in Ontario whereby only 72 per cent of workplaces protect their workers under the compensation system managed by the WSIB. Their campaign material states: "That's the lowest rate in the country, and it leaves 1.8 million Ontario workers with no WSIB protection in the event of a workplace illness or injury." CUPE is demanding that the draft policies be scrapped and that the Ontario government ensure that workers' compensation is universal and that all employers collectively fund the compensation system.

Proposed Benefits Changes Will Significantly Reduce Compensation

The Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario, Ontario Nurses' Association, Ontario Public Service Employees' Union, Service Employees International Union, Ontario Professional Firefighters' Association, Provincial Building and Construction Trades Council of Ontario, Teamsters Canada Rail Conference and the Society of Energy Professionals, in a joint letter to Elizabeth Witmer, state that in their view the policy on pre-existing conditions is simply a prescription to deny workers' claims, and for direct decision-makers to ignore the long accepted significant contributing factor test, a test that is used to determine whether a worker's injury or condition is compensable.

They highlight the fact that not only will the proposed benefits polices significantly reduce the compensation owed to injured workers but they will impact return to work and health and safety. They say employers will have little incentive to return injured workers to work when their accident costs are significantly reduced by these policy changes and the reduced claims costs will have a negative impact on the employers' obligation to provide a healthy and safe workplace.

The unions oppose the policies which attempt to diminish the contribution of work to the disability and that create a disposable workforce.

(injuredworkersonline.org, Facebook, ONIWG Consultation Meeting March 2014, wsib.on.ca)

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