The number of workers hurt on the job in Canada has continued to fall over the last decade, but some labour experts say both workplace safety and provincially run workers' compensation systems designed to aid injured workers are still far from ideal.

The Association of Workers' Compensation Boards of Canada (AWCBC) reports that there has been a downward trend in the number of accepted time-loss injuries - injuries recognized and accepted by individual boards - across Canada over the past 10 years.

In 2004, 340,502 accepted time-loss injuries were registered, compared with 348,715 the previous year and 430,756 in 1994.

However, the Canadian Labour Congress (CLC) and other labour bodies say these numbers can be misleading.

J.J. Ali, Business Edge
CN employee Mike Nickerson, in a University of Manitoba classroom, has been frustrated in his dealings with the WCB.

"Lost-time accepted claims offer a snapshot, but it's skewed," says Bill Chedore, the CLC national co-ordinator of health, safety and the environment.

"It doesn't reflect the true number of incidents that take place; that's a number that's difficult to pin down" in part because it only shows the accepted claims. But Chedore also says he has anecdotal evidence that some employers encourage injured workers to hush up, to avoid higher Workers' Compensation Board (WCB) premiums.

Alberta Federation of Labour president Gil McGowan agrees lost-time claims don't tell the whole story, in many cases because employers allow injured workers to assume lighter duties until they're well enough to return to their normal job. These injuries sometimes go unreported.

While the federation supports so-called modified work regimes - where employers try to keep injured personnel in the workplace when medically safe to do so - the group takes exception to government and industry using the situation to make safety records appear better than they are.

"Modified work regimes can be good things ... but we have a problem when they're used for a purpose they were never intended for," says McGowan.

In Ontario, time-loss injuries fell to 90,397 in 2004 from 93,234 in 2003; in Manitoba it slipped 326 to 17,260 over that period; in Saskatchewan it fell to 13,880 from 15,135; Alberta experienced a decline to 35,969 from 37,335; and B.C. saw accepted time-loss injuries drop to 52,286 from 56,946.

But while Alberta lost-time claims fell in 2004, the total number of new claims reported - which also includes no lost-time and rejected lost-time claims - actually crept up to 154,377 from 153,098 over the same period, according to WCB statistics.

But WCBs across the country say efforts such as safety education programs are cutting workplace injuries and fatalities.

Janice Siekawitch, a spokeswoman for the Saskatchewan WCB, says a safety program called WorkSafe Saskatchewan has translated into tangible improvements.

"In 2002 we had an injury rate that was one of the worst in the country" at 4.95 injuries per 100 workers, says Siekawitch.

But since the implementation of the WorkSafe program in 2003, the rate has fallen to 4.4 per 100 in 2004. Siekawitch says preliminary results for 2005 indicate the rate declined again to less than 4.2-per-100.

It's a similar story in Alberta, where the rate has continued to fall, the provincial board says.

Officials credit an improved safety record to a number of factors, including a co-operative approach among government, business owners and employees to spread the safety message.

Alberta WCB spokeswoman Wendy Theberge says the board believes its Partners in Injury Reduction program, in place since the 1990s, has played a pivotal role.

Companies that participate in the program and see their safety record improve are eligible for WCB premium rebates. In 2004, about 5,000 companies earned $66.7 million in rebates.

"The bottom line is that businesses are realizing millions of dollars in rebates because of the program," says Theberge. "The number of claims are decreasing, at least in the last three years."

The B.C. government, meanwhile, recently announced it will hire a coroner dedicated to forest safety as part of a plan to cut the risk of working in the province's forest industry, one of the most dangerous sectors in the province.

The move will complement a series of safety plans unveiled by the industry in reaction to 43 forestry-related deaths and 110 serious injuries last year.

"What we want to do ... is see if there's a systemic side to the deaths," B.C. Forest Minister Rich Coleman said.

The government will also hire special safety officials in the forest ministry and the B.C. Timber Sales Program to coincide with a forest-safety ombudsman already announced by the B.C. Forest Safety Council.

Lynn Buekert, director of policy development for the B.C. Federation of Labour, says these efforts represent an important advance for the forest industry, but adds "it is unacceptable that so many employees in one sector would die - we find any workplace fatality unacceptable when they're preventable.

"I think we have to look more broadly than just (the forestry) industry - I'm not negating what is happening there, which is bad - but there are problems elsewhere," adds Buekert.

She says that in 2005 there were 185 work-related deaths in B.C., some from exposures to hazardous materials. In 2004 B.C.'s board reported 136 fatalities, down from 170 in 2003.

Buekert blames the rise in fatalities in part on a move toward self-regulation by employers and staff cuts at the provincial WCB in past years.

WCBs across Canada, meanwhile, remain in the crosshairs of employers and employees alike. Workers criticize them for being obstructive, bureaucratic and unyielding, while businesses call them inefficient government entities.

Judith Andrew, vice-president for Ontario with the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, says small businesses across Canada are actually "quite safe," with an average accident frequency of about one accident every nine years, according to the organization's calculations.

"Typically you have the owner/manager worker right alongside the employees and they tend to pay a lot of attention to safety," Andrew says. "It's a family-type atmosphere."

Despite a low average, Canada's small and medium-sized businesses are saddled with WCB premiums that in many cases take a substantial chunk out of the company's bottom line, says Andrew.

On average, Ontario businesses pay $2.26 to workers' comp in premiums for every $100 of salary. "It can really add up," she says.

Mike Nickerson, an electrician injured on the job while working for Canadian National Railway in Winnipeg, says his own dealings with the WCB have been frustrating.

In 1994, Nickerson sustained a brain injury when a 248-kilogram elevator he was working on fell.

"I was out, and I actually had a near-death experience," Nickerson says. "It had my face pinned to the ground ... it's really a miracle. At least I'm alive."

The 50-year-old says that from the get-go, he has had to scrape and claw for many of the WCB benefits he's received. One of his victories was getting the board to fund post-secondary training.

Nickerson says the board offered to send him to community college, but he had his sights set higher, wanting to give university a try.

After another scrap with the WCB, he was permitted to take a course at the University of Winnipeg.

He has since transferred into the University of Manitoba's Labour and Workplace Studies program. He hopes that when he's finished he'll be able to return to CN to help draft labour policies and strategies.

Julie Guard, head of the U of M's labour and workplace studies program, says a number of students in her department come by way of the WCB, saying most have to "make their case extremely well.”

But, she adds, it's "terrific they can do this here; it's hard, but it's possible."

She notes that compared with WCBs in other parts of Canada, Manitoba's workers' comp legislation is "relatively worker-friendly."

- with files from The Canadian Press

(John Ludwick can be reached at ludwick@businessedge.ca)