Workplace safety top of mind as 30th anniversary of the Westray mine disaster approaches

Plans are in the works for the Westray anniversary and Canada’s National Day of Mourning

CIYTnews halifax \ Michael Lightstone

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Workplace safety will be on the minds of many Nova Scotians later this month and in May.

That’s when injured workers, relatives and friends of victims of industrial fatalities, members of labour groups and others will gather at commemorative events remembering those who’ve died or been hurt on the job, or became sick because of their work.

Last year, 20 people died at work or because of their job due to such issues as occupational diseases, the Workers’ Compensation Board of Nova Scotia says.

On May 9, 1992, 26 employees were killed early in the morning during a single shift in Plymouth, Pictou County.

The men died when the underground coal mine they were in exploded. Next month will mark the 30th anniversary of the Westray disaster.

Plans are in the works for the Westray anniversary and Canada’s National Day of Mourning, an annual remembrance on April 28 honouring occupational health-and-safety victims and survivors.

Danny Cavanagh, president of the Nova Scotia Federation of Labour, said the subtext of these events is needless deaths are still happening in preventable workplace accidents, and few company owners or managers are being held accountable for what he said essentially amounts to criminal negligence.

He said the federal Westray Law, which was enacted in 2004 and covers criminal liability for industrial deaths and injuries, isn’t working “as it was intended to do.”

In a commentary posted in February on the federation’s website, the organization’s leadership didn’t mince words.

“Changing workplace safety will only happen when employers, including those in the boardroom, learn that if negligence is determined in a workplace death, they could and should go to jail,” the opinion piece said.

“In the labour movement, we often use the phrase, ‘kill a worker – go to jail,’” it said.

Cavanagh said in an interview that since the Westray Law came into being 18 years ago, one charge has been laid in Nova Scotia. It resulted in a not guilty verdict in 2019 related to a workplace death, in Halifax Regional Municipality, that happened six years earlier.

In Nova Scotia, since the passing of the Westray Law, more than 400 people have died at work or because of it, Cavanagh said last month.

He said the Westray bill’s case law across the country is limited.

“Somebody gets up in the morning and goes to work, you expect they’re going to come home at suppertime,” said Cavanagh. “And when that doesn’t happen it’s a tragedy for the whole family, but a lot of times there’s still no criminal charges being laid. It’s really a sad reality.”

Cavanagh stressed “there’s something terribly wrong with the Westray bill – it’s too hard to meet that (legal) test in the courtroom” for criminal liability to be established.

With respect to the reporting of work-related fatalities, the Workers’ Compensation Board acknowledges there are “almost certainly” other deaths due to work that have not been recorded.

For instance, the death toll from loss of life due to industrial disease is reflective of “WCB Nova Scotia-covered workplaces,” its website says. “There are very likely other deaths due to occupational diseases.”

In its 2020 annual report, the board noted returning to work after recovering from being hurt on the job has changed over the years.

“While the (COVID-19) pandemic was a factor, we are seeing increasingly complex claims where there are often psychological considerations to physical injuries,” the report said.

A recent industrial fatality happened in the Halifax region last month.

On March 25, police and provincial workplace-safety investigators were called to the scene of a suspected electrocution at a job site in Upper Sackville. A power company technician with Nova Scotia Power died after working on a power line.

On April 28, the labour federation will be hosting a National Day of Mourning ceremony outside Province House in downtown Halifax. The organization represents about 70,000 members of affiliated unions.

“It’s going to be an in-person event,” Cavanagh said. “We do it every year at the legislature, with the exception of those two years of COVID.”

On May 9, in the New Glasgow area, anniversary plans linked to the Westray explosion include a 7 p.m. assembly at the Westray Miners Memorial Park. There’s to be a roundtable discussion about the Westray Law that day, as well.

Organizers include relatives of the deceased workers, the United Steelworkers union, provincial government and Nova Scotia Federation of Labour.

Cavanagh said local students are scheduled to attend part of the remembrance.

“We’re going to bring some kids into the (provincial) Museum of Industry” in Stellarton, he said.

“There’ll be a display set up there. Kids will get to talk to some people about occupational health-and-safety (and) hopefully they’ll get to meet . . . some of the people that were first on scene” when the tragedy took place three decades ago, Cavanagh said.

A public inquiry that examined the Westray disaster found, among other things, it resulted from a “complex mosaic of actions, omissions, mistakes, incompetence, apathy, cynicism, stupidity and neglect.”

Many of the miners killed on the job were in their 30s. The youngest, Robert Doyle, was 22 years old, and the oldest, John Bates, was 56.

Not all explosion victims were retrieved from the now-shuttered mine; the remains of 11 workers are still underground.

The Westray mine had been operating for eight months before it blew up. Two landmark silos at the site were demolished in 1998 after the victims’ families campaigned to have them razed.

The worker-safety branch of the provincial Department of Labour, Skills and Immigration has a toll-free phone number to report occupational health-and-safety concerns. Call 1-800-952-2687.

Michael Lightstone is a freelance reporter living in Dartmouth