April 25, 2006

Occupational disease focus of CSAO head

PETER KENTER

correspondent

TORONTO

Neil McCormick has two words for the conditions he encountered in 1967 as a new steamfitter in the Hamilton steel mills: dirty and dangerous.

“There was a lot of moving equipment and machinery, a lot of asbestos, a lot of toxic chemicals, and a lot of oils and fumes. There were only basic protections,” McCormick said. “I wondered what I had gotten myself into. Back then, everybody knew about falls. Everybody knew about the traumatic injuries. But there was very little awareness of occupational disease.”

McCormick, who left his position as Business Manager of the Ontario Pipe Trades Council to become the president of the Construction Safety Association of Ontario (CSAO) this month, says one of his priorities is to increase awareness of occupational disease.

“We need to spread health and safety awareness to every worker ...”

Neil McCormick

President, CSAO

“Disease is the number one killer of construction workers in Ontario and probably around the world. In Ontario, 20 workers died from injury in 2005, but there were 35 accepted claims for fatal disease,” he said. “The numbers show that, in construction, the pipe trades have the highest number of deaths and diseases from working with asbestos.

“Even now, when I go to pipefitter meetings, there’s a disturbing percentage of people who don’t know what mesothelioma is.”

While traumatic injuries provide an object lesson in immediate consequences, occupational diseases often don’t, says McCormick.

“If you fall off a roof, you know you’ll get hurt right away and you might die,” he said. “But if you encounter some asbestos, will you die right away? No. Is it certain you’ll die from it in the future? No. It’s not tangible to some people, so they don’t take the care they should. They feel that they’re somehow exempt.”

McCormick also wants CSAO to reach out to non-unionized workers.

“This is difficult because there aren’t the same administrative channels in place. We need to spread health and safety awareness to every worker on every job site — whether unionized or not.”

McCormick also says he intends to use inventive approaches to get through to contractors.

“Take the WSIB’s Safety Groups program,” he says. “It’s a mentoring program. The point is to involve contractors in a positive project instead of punishing them. We need more projects like this.”

He also has a prescription for contractors who won’t toe the line.

“Enforcement. The more Ministry of Labour (MOL) inspectors the better,” he says. And I think the MOL can get tougher.

“With all the information that’s available now, with all the structures in place, there’s little excuse for ignorance of health and safety laws.”

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