Failure in mining responsibility system: USW representative

The first day of the mines safety review committee in Sudbury held Wednesdaywrapped upwith a suggestion from the United Steelworkers that the hearings hadnt been publicized well enough.

The province is holding review sessions in mining communities across Ontario to look at the health and safety of workers in the mining sector.

In Sudbury, the first day of the talks heard mostly from organized labour representatives. Much of the discussions focused on theinternal responsibility system also called the "IRS".

The system is supposed to holdeveryone accountable right up to the president to report health and safety violations and to problem-solve to make workplaces safer.

However, a Steelworkers representative told the hearing the system breaks down when theres a disagreement over whether something is safe or not.

Myles Sullivan said workers may also be nervous about reporting a safety issue forfear of reprisal, and added the system didnt work in the deaths of two men in a run of muck at Vales Frood-Stobie mine in 2011.

Absolutely, there was a failure of the IRS there unfortunately, he said.

Thats why its so important for workers to be trained on it [and] for supervisors to be trained on it, believe in it, use it and make it work.

The chair of the committee, George Gritziotis, said the IRS is the common thread through many of the issues that his committee is working on. Headded he doesnt want to associate its breakdown with any particular incident.

IRS is about how you know supervisors, workers and co-workers are all ensuring that their health and welfare and safety in the workplace is taken care of, he said.

Werent aware of it

Meanwhile, beyond talks of safety, Sullivan said he felt the hearings werent publicized well enough. He also said he knows ofsome people who wereturned away.

There may be a lot of people, especially in Kirkland Lake and Timmins that didnt have a chance to come out to voice their concerns and ideas and thoughts because they werent aware of it, he said.

Sullivan acknowledged he thought the first day of hearings in Sudbury went well, but said he would have liked to have seen some mine managers in addition to labour officials.

Gritziotis said he was puzzled by Sullivans comment that some people were turned away, adding if it was a communications gap, it would be looked into.

Gritziotis said anyone is welcome to speak, and submissions can be accepted over the phone or informally over a cup of coffee if the person doesn't want to speak publicly.

The second hearing takes place in Sudbury on Thursday at 2:30 p.m. at the downtown library branch.