Activists rally for the rights of injured workers

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Toronto – June 2, 2015 – UFCW Canada activists gathered with social justice allies from across Ontario at Queen's Park in Toronto on Injured Workers' Day – June 1, to protest against benefit cuts and policy changes by the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board of Ontario (WSIB).

Hundreds of activists, including workers who have been injured or sustained a disability through workplace hazards, gathered in front of the Ontario Legislative Building before marching in solidarity to the Ontario Ministry of Labour offices advocating for changes to the WSIB system – a compensation system that many activists who attended the rally deemed hostile to injured workers – the very people the system is supposed to protect.

Currently, there  are employers in Ontario that are being allowed to get away without paying into Ontario's workplace health and safety prevention and enforcement system, leaving many workers in the province without WSIB coverage.

Activists also called on the Ontario government to put an end to the poverty facing injured workers; to extend mandatory WSIB coverage for all workers; and to restore injured workers benefits with a full cost-of-living increment.

Later this spring, UFCW Canada will be fully participating in an Ontario government formal review of the province's labour and employment standards, including better inspection and enforcement of workplace safety standards.