Fantastic, this is who you want in an emergency scenario.. WCB investigators.. just look how they got to the bottom of the sawmill issues…

well there is the gas companies excuse to raise gas prices again…

If this accident involves worker injuries or fatalities, WorksafeBC will find a way to screw up the investigation. Almost everything this government oversees becomes incompetent; from mining safety, to oil & gas safety, right through to the agency tht investigates workplace accidents.

I also have no trust in worksafe BC as this government oversees it.

@SS

So exactly how is the government or worksafe responsible for:

>a union head not taking leave from his moonlighting job so he could give his complete and undivided attention to the safety of local union members after the Burns Lake tragedy.

>no followup by 1-424 safety seatwarmers to find out if there was anything to the anonymous calls made to local union office.

>failure of union joint safety committee members to show up for meetings with management or ensure an alternate member take their place and once again union local officers are MIA to find out why.

Work safe is supposed to make sure ALL work places are following the rules.. No matter Union or non Union.

Sparrow.. Do you even know if this was a union site.. Or just needed to get your blame on unions?

Hoping they are non Union.. Be cool to see a sparrow eat crow..lol

bcracer, could it be possible to make a more bonehead post?

I am a union member and have dealt with Work Safe on numerous occasions as a union safety rep I bet almost everybody who has posted here has never personally dealt with work safe and are going off of rumours and here say Or bad news articles written in the news

I have both disagreed and agreed with policies set forth by them and have had occasion to speak about their policies personally to WorkSafe if you want to argue about How bad WorkSafe is then Maybe you should talk to them personally they have an open door policy and if you want to argue I will argue

Dearth- If I were you I would not assume that there are no other union members or union safety reps that have posted on this site. There are many people I would assume that have had problems with worksafe.

I have dealt with WokSafe for some 20 years and have been on joint safety committees as an employer rep. Not only that, but I have had to make sure that those things identified during regular safety inspections by the joint safety committee to be in my departments of responsibility had to be corrected and reported so during subsequent meetings.

It is the employer’s responsibility to make sure the committees work. It can take some diplomacy when one gets belligerent people on either side.

I have also dealt with WorkSafe claims division in representing workers at administrative appeal hearings. I also deal with the prevention division, especially dealing with enforcement of the regs in the workplace.

My general feeling is that WorkSafe is no different than any other organization as far as the standard of work goes. Some people have very high standards, others are just average. I am sure there are some slackers too.

The thing I do not like is when someone uses their authority and position to write an order which should never have been written. At the same time, there are times when an order is not written, and it should have been. In both cases the question has to be asked, why – incompetence or abuse of authority. No different than any other enforcement agency.

Thank you Gopg2015 you put it very well

Oldman1 I know and understand there are people that post here that have dealt with WorkSafe however the vast majority that post here do not nor have not dealt with WorkSafe and their opinions are very skewed because they go on public opinion and articles written without having the full facts

WorkSafe is by no means perfect and have made mistakes some with severe consequences however they are there for worker protection and like us have to learn and live with decisions made

Dearth, my understanding of the situation at Lakeland was that union reps, shop stewards and/or union members who formed part of the joint safely committee failed to show up at safety meetings on a fairly regular basis.

Perhaps you can set the record straight, although most of us are fairly certain that this was public knowledge after the fact! Sparrows comments seem to follow this school of thought!

If Worksafe is there for the worker protection why would they call the employer one week ahead to let them know they are coming to do an inspection? But then it would give them time to do some cleanup so it looks good on the day of inspection.

My point being, as I’ve stated many times before, there is a lot of blame being tossed around regarding both the Burns Lake and the Lakeland tragedies and so far as of yet, I have yet to hear the Union acknowledge that they had a part to play. Perhaps that’s because they are too busy pointing fingers at others?

Interesting; when you read gopg2015 and Dearth’s comments, both are filled with their “personal opinion”, and ask us not to go on “public opinion”, and articles written without having the FULL FACTS.

I share in the frustrations of some other readers about not having the full facts!!! So why will the Provincial Government not support a Full Independent Public Inquiry into the the Babine and Lakeland sawmill explosions, so that the FULL FACTS can be made public?

Until that happens, don’t be talking to us about our opinions being skewed, just because we don’t have the FULL FACTS!!!

I cannot nor will not offer opinion on why Union or company officials did not meet at Lakeland

However there are known facts that came from the investigation

-WorkSafe investigators were not trained in dust explosions nor what signs to look for and mill employees while concerned about dust buildup the vast majority never considered dust explosions a high priority as we work with and in it every day
-Union, WorkSafe and company officials knew and understood that there was issues with dust buildup however neither side officially acted upon the problem
-every sawmill, pulpmill and pellet plant operated with insane amounts of dust accumulations with the understanding of the time that this was a SoP and all sides understood the fire risk a situation with which we lived with for as long as there has been mills and while things were said actions were rarely taken on all sides
-WorkSafe inspectors now regularly inspect for dust accumulations and many operations are written up and assessed a financial penalty however with that being said most mills dust is now a top priority as it is cleaned up daily and millions have been spent to improve dust collection and the difference is night and day from 3 yrs ago

this is an explosion in the oil and gas sector, the circumstances could be vastly different from the oil and gas sector. I hope the BC safety authority is following up to find up what the issues are that allowed for such an explosion as I have family that works in the sector.

Yes, their maybe a difference between the dust accumulations from the past and what is their today, however I can tell you from personal experience, that the companies are more worried about being caught with there pants down, rather than providing a safe environment for the employees. It will take another explosion and workers being injured or killed and someone being held accountable with criminal charges, before anything really changes, as production still trumps anything over safety!

Worksafe is just another government bureaucracy. Why would any one expect it to be anything but dysfunctional?

dow7501, nice comment, you have no rebuttal so you resort to personal attacks, very mature of you.