Small Tenures Safety Meeting

Ladies and Gents

Currently there is an initiative ongoing to come up with a series of bulletins regarding Safety in Partial Cutting.  The main objective is to provide non-industry boards with some direction regarding safety considerations to be aware of if they are considering the use of partial harvests in their areas.  Typically talking about Community Forests and First Nations woodlots where the management goals may be being set by people without a great deal of direct industry knowledge. After attended a meeting of the Small Tenures safety committee and I thought while it is fresh I should give you all a bit of a summary. 

The main topics of conversation today were with regards to changes to OHS regulations.  Specifically Part 16 regarding Mobile Equipment and Part 26 regarding load securement.  I have not dug in to either deeply but from the sounds of it the Part 26 changes make things much more prescriptive.  There was concern expressed that individuals working largely for small tenures may not be aware or have opportunity to address some of the changes in the same way that people hauling for the majors might.  Something to be aware of at least.

One issue looking forward is changes to the first aid requirements and the definitions around what is a High, Medium and Low risk worksite.  There is also new requirements for those worksites which are difficult to access (ie BC ambulance can not reach it).  These are preliminary changes – likely a couple of years off given the pace at which the beaurocracy moves.  There is an opportunity at this time for industry to have some input.  I have not dug in to this yet but I got the sense from the discussion that there may be some changes that are hard to accommodate for small operations.  I have included a copy of the proposed revisions for you to review.  I would appreciate your thoughts as it might be something that we can influence through this group. 

Please see Attached - PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO PART 3: RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES IN THE OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH AND SAFETY REGULATION