A message from Dave Killham
Executive
Director, WHSC
 Great things can be accomplished when you set a goal and
direct your efforts to achieving it. Even greater things can happen when you
secure the training and the skills to make that goal a reality.
Worker volunteer health and safety activists do both. By working to end the
suffering associated with work-related injury, illness and death, they set
their sights high because their ultimate goal is prevention. In pursuit of this
objective and to fulfill their considerable rights and responsibilities as joint
committee members, certified members, health and safety representatives and
union representatives, they also complete, and often deliver, this health and
safety training to their co-workers.
Frequently, this training takes the form of Workers Health & Safety
Centre (WHSC) training, for the WHSC is the only health and safety training
centre endorsed by the labour movement.
Regardless, armed with this winning combination of training and tenacity, in
2009, volunteer health and safety activists helped achieve a significant
legislative gain in the form of Bill 168, An Act to amend the Occupational
Health and Safety Act with respect to violence and harassment in the
workplace. This victory is the result of a persistent and focused labour
campaign led by activists across all sectors intent on securing legal protection
against workplace violence.
Similar dogged campaigns have yielded other major gains including Workplace
Hazardous Materials Information System (WHMIS) and in more recent years expanded
legal powers and training for joint health and safety committees through the
Certification process. Thirty years ago this fall, the Occupational Health
& Safety Act was passed, an historic event unlikely to have occurred had
it not been for the unrelenting efforts of workplace activists at the time.
Bolstered by their most recent achievement, volunteer activists are
refocusing their legislative agenda. In addition to ensuring the passage and
proper enforcement of Bill 168, activists also have in their sights an improved
Certification training standard, mandatory training for new workers, chemical
management regulations aimed at supporting worker, community and ecological
health, and ergonomic regulations in every province.
We celebrate all of these accomplishments to date, and those yet to come, as
part of the 14th annual WHSC Volunteer Activist Recognition Campaign. Like
volunteer activists, the WHSC knows the value of setting goals and marshalling
our efforts. For more than 25 years we have proudly offered training and
information resources in support of your many workplace initiatives. Recently,
we were first to launch a Certification Renewal program, just one of our
recommendations we hope will make for an improved Certification standard.
Updated in 2009, Canadian Level 1 program will inform activists across
the country of their rights and responsibilities in their home jurisdiction. Our
new program for small workplaces, without benefit of joint committees, will help
ensure workers and their representatives, are equally well prepared to carry out
their considerable responsibilities.
Next on our list of training development objectives are extensive updates to
our Certification Part II sector program for health care and social
services and a comprehensive program for new workers. But whatever the program,
we work to ensure high quality health and safety training reaches as many
workers and their representatives as possible, so health and safety prevention
and worker well-being is attained. To learn more about the many WHSC training
programs currently offered, see our training program
catalogue or call us at 1-888-869-7950.
Our shared vision is clear. Together, let's train our sights and our
activists on prevention. On this too, we can be just as tenacious.
TRAINING OUR SIGHTS ON
PREVENTION
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