The Toronto Star, with its usual reforming zeal, has investigated complaints made about the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). Its article of July 23 claims the number of complaints made to the provincial watchdog about Ontario's worker compensation system is up 20% over the past year. Nearly 600 complaints between last April and March of this year, a jump from 2014/15 when there were 480 grievances against the board.
141 complaints have been lodged since March.
Doctors, labour groups, and injured workers' lawyers are demanding an investigation. They allege the WSIB ignore the diagnoses of victims own doctors which leads them being "kicked off benefits."
The Star has detailed allegations of unfair and unlawful cost cutting measures that include the use of so-called 'paper doctors' who review injured workers' files without examining them in person and wrongly attributing accident victims symptoms to pre-existing conditions so as to reduce compensation.
To quote Aidan MacDonald of the Injured Workers Consultants' Community Legal Clinic: "It's a pretty good indication to the ombudsman that external intervention is needed. Injured workers are just being cut off benefits.
They're being denied treatment that they need, they're being denied medication that they need."
Such news to workers is not surprising. Those who attempt to administrate capital. John Ayers.
No comments:
Post a Comment