Day of Mourning 2024

Day of Mourning-April 28, 2024

For Immediate Release-Grey Bruce Labour Council

Family members, friends and co-workers honour the sad and tragic anniversaries of people lost to workplace accidents and illness everyday. Canada experiences over one-thousand workplace related deaths every year. Ontario accounts for almost one death each day of each year. By taking time each April to participate in a Day of Mourning ceremony, we can collectively show our respect for those lost, and our compassion for those left to grieve. For the Day of Mourning to have real meaning, each of us needs to live up to the action words of the day, and we must commit to “Fighting for the living and mourning for the dead” .

Two seminal events will mark milestone anniversaries in 2024, both of which have contributed significantly to the legacy of progress in worker health and safety. It has been twenty years since the Bill C-45, or the Westray Act, was made into law and fifty years since the uranium miners of Elliott Lake downed tools in a wildcat strike in response to the death and sickness of their co-workers in the mines.

The Westray Bill is Federal Legislation that amended the Canadian Criminal Code and became law on March 31, 2004. The Bill, introduced in 2003 by the United Steelworkers, established new legal duties for workplace health and safety, and imposed serious penalties for violations that result in injuries or death. Driven by the staggering negligence and disregard for life at the Westray coal mine in Nova Scotia and the mine explosion that resulted in the deaths of nearly 30 miners, the bill provided new rules for attributing criminal liability to organizations, including corporations, their representatives and those who direct the work of others. Launched by the Ontario Federation of Labour, president of the Grey Bruce Labour Council, Kevin Smith, recalls the “Kill a worker, go to jail” campaign put forth by the Ontario Federation of Labour.

In 1974 the success of the wildcat strike by uranium miners, members of the United Steelworkers in Elliott Lake, Ontario brought about the Royal Inquiry that produced recommendations that laid the very foundation for the Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act. No law, before or since, has had as important or progressive a change for health and safety of workers in Ontario.

On the Day of Mourning, where we recommit to the struggle to improve the health and safety of all workplaces, workers gone by, and the collective action of these workers and their representatives have provided the shoulders we stand on to turn this commitment into action and reality.  

Chris Stephen, Grey Bruce Labour Council VP for Grey, is leading the way in setting a Day of Mourning ceremony in place at the Chesley Community Centre. Stephen says “this event is the first of its kind for our region. Communities and community leaders from the entire Grey-Bruce area are being invited to attend at 10:30AM on April the 28^th.  Arran-Elderslie is of great help in getting this off the ground and on the 28^th of April this ceremony will be the center of recommitting to the health and safety of all workers as we mourn for all those killed, injured and made ill in workplaces the world over”.

Dave Trumble, Labour Council VP for Bruce will be chairing an event at Bruce Power where business and labour leadership will take time to remember and to mourn. “Despite years lost to COVID, where virtual acknowledgement of the day took place, there has been a Day of Mourning ceremony on the site of Bruce Power since 1995 and this is an enviable record of caring.”

Hazel Pratt, Labour Council delegate, will be leading the annual Day of Mourning ceremony in Hanover of the 26^th of April. This will take place at Heritage Square at 11AM.

               The Grey Bruce Labour Council has been the voice of workers in Grey and Bruce Counties since 1956. The Labour Council welcomes all media inquiries.