Canadian Safety Reporter

5 Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2015 5 Canadian HR Reporter, a Thomson Reuters business 2015 News | December 2015 | CSR Don't put all safety eggs in one basket Company's reliance on single employee for all safety matters backfired when employee was electrocuted BY JEFFREY R. SMITH A NOVA SCOTIA company must pay more than $40,000 in fi nes after leaving all its health and safety matters in the hands of an employee who electro- cuted himself, the Nova Scotia Provincial Court has ruled. Christopher Boyle, 38, was an electrician for R.D. Longard Services, a commercial and residential electrical services company. He was experienced in his work and the company considered him safety-con- scious. Longard's confi dence in Boyle led it to rely on him to take care of jobs with proper safety precautions, as it had no formal safety program. e company made Boyle the safe- ty offi cer and tasked him in De- cember 2012 with developing a safety program for Longard employees. Boyle took courses to help with creating a manual that would make Longard be- coming safety certifi ed with the Nova Scotia Construction Safety Association (NSCSA). At worksites, the company relied exclusively on Boyle to instruct employees and pro- mote workplace safety. In the spring of 2013, Lon- gard contracted its services to a construction company called Suncoast Construction to install electrical service for a new retail space in a Halifax strip mall. At the time, Boyle was still working on the safety manual but no-one with the company had seen it yet. e strip mall had a dedicat- ed electrical room with a cabi- net containing the electrical meters of all the mall tenants — the entire cabinet housed 600 volts of operating voltage. e new retail tenant in the mall required new feeder cable for the electrical cabinet. Electrician electrocuted On May 21, 2013, Boyle went to the strip mall with two oth- er employees to fi nish tying down the new feeder cable. ey took the face plate off the compartment that needed to be accessed, which was at the bottom of the electrical cabi- net. Because of the compart- ment's low position, Boyle had to lie on the fl oor on his back with his arms extended into the opening. He had to reach into the back of the cabinet to reach the cable, where the bus bars were also located. ere was a large number of wires in the compartment, which Boyle had to move out of the way to access the connection. Because it was during the day, the workers didn't cut electrical service to the cabinet so existing mall tenants weren't inconvenienced. is meant the bus bars in the back of the cabinet were energized. Boyle was working when the other two employees saw his body suddenly go rigid and straight. When he didn't respond to them saying his name, they pulled him out from under the electrical cabi- net. Boyle was unresponsive, so they started CPR and called paramedics. However, he could not be revived. e two other employees noticed Boyle's knuckles on one hand were bloody, indicat- ing he had come into contact with the bus bars. A Nova Scotia Power wiring inspector was at the worksite the next day and observed that the switches for the electrical cabinet were on. e system was then de-energized by a utility crew from the outside. Another company later com- pleted the electrical work on a Sunday so the electrical system could be shut down without troubling the mall tenants. Suncoast, the construction company for whom R.D. Lon- gard was performing the work, was surprised the work was being done during the day, as it had expected it to be handled after hours or on weekends so the power to the electrical cabinet could be cut. e con- tract stipulated that "the work of adjacent tenants shall not be interrupted at any time." Longard was charged under the Nova Scotia Occupational Health and Safety Act for fail- ing to take "every precaution reasonable in the circumstanc- es to provide such information, instruction, or supervision" to ensure Boyle's safety. e com- pany was also charged under related regulations for failing as an employer "to ensure that an electrical installation was serviced, repaired or disman- tled in accordance with the Credit: Shutterstock Too much > pg. 8

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