MOL Initiative: Reducing Workplace Injuries

The goal is that, by 2008, there will be 60,000 fewer workplace injuries per year. On average, there are almost 300,000 workplace-related injuries per year, with about 100,000 serious enough to require people to miss work. A 20 per cent reduction over four years would result in approximately 60,000 fewer injuries by 2008, including 20,000 fewer injuries of the type serious enough to require people to miss work.

The government’s plan will focus on workplaces with the highest injury rates and costs. The bottom two per cent--6,000 high-risk workplaces--are being targeted by Ministry of Labour inspectors. The ministry has hired an additional 100 inspectors, who have now graduated from their first phase of training and are being deployed across the province. An additional 100 inspectors will be hired by March 2006.

Inspectors will visit these sites four times a year, focusing on workplace hazards to help firms reduce on-the-job injuries. Although these workplaces represent just two per cent of all firms insured by the WSIB, they account for 10 per cent of all lost-time injuries and 21 per cent of injury costs in Ontario.

For more information on this and other MOL initiatives, visit their website at www.gov.on.ca/lab.