• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
Injured Workers Online

Injured Workers Online

Working Together for Justice

  • Blog
  • Sign Up
  • About
  • Twitter
Working Together for Justice
  • Workers’ Compensation
    • History
    • Law Reform
    • Workers’ compensation bills
    • Chronic Pain Victory
    • Research and Education
    • Bancroft Institute
    • Meredith Conference: “No-Half Measures”
    • RAACWI
  • Issues
    • Appeals
    • Benefits
    • Cost of living adjustments
    • Deeming
    • Pre-existing conditions
    • Experience Rating
    • Funding
    • Mental Health
    • Poverty
    • Return to Work
    • Stigma and surveillance
    • Universal Coverage
  • Community
    • Ontario Network of Injured Workers Groups (ONIWG)
    • Workers’ Comp Is a Right campaign
    • Injured Worker Groups
    • IW Speakers School
    • Injured Workers’ Stories
    • Arts & social justice
  • Events
    • Calendar View
    • RSI Awareness Day
    • Day of Mourning
    • Injured Workers Day
    • Women of Inspiration Vigil
    • Labour Day – a workers’ festival
  • Media
    • Press Releases
    • Fact Sheets
    • Headlines on workers’ compensation
    • Videos
  • Resources
    • Law and Policy Submissions
    • Reports, Articles & Papers
    • Practical guides & booklets
    • IWHP Bulletins
    • Library
    • Find Legal Help
    • Links
Home / Blog / Actions & Campaigns / Injured workers take their message to the WSIB

Injured workers take their message to the WSIB

December 13, 2016

December demo 2016 outside WSIBInjured workers held their annual Toronto December demo yesterday, this year outside the WSIB HQ on Front St. Willy Noiles, president of the Ontario Network of Injured Workers’ Groups (ONIWG), led off the rally highlighting key concerns about workers’ compensation coverage, the Board’s chronic mental stress policy, denial of time to heal under “Better at Work”,  and disregard of treating doctors’ opinions. [Read also the ONIWG letter  sent Monday to the Premier on the impacts of the austerity agenda and injured worker concerns]

Also addressing the crowd on return to work, denied claims and health benefits issues were activists Indira Rupichand (Injured Workers Action 4 Justice), Julia Lucas (St. Catharine’s injured worker group), Chris Ramsaroop (Justicia 4 Migrant Workers) and Workers’ Action Centre co-ordinator, Deena Ladd.

Once again, there was strong labour support from the United Steelworkers (Merv King), Unifor (Vinay Sharma), OPSEU (Terri Aversa).  Andy Summers of the Ontario Nurses Association called attention to the toll on the province’s nurses not only from soft tissue injuries but also from physical and mental injuries caused by workplace violence and harassment. He repeated the ONA’s call for presumptive PTSD legislation that does not limit the occupations eligible to make a worker’s compensation claim. Prominent workers’ compensation lawyer Gary Newhouse questioned the WSIB’s professed inability to change the traumatic mental stress policy without legislative reform, citing previous instances where the Board had made such policy changes.

Following a performance by the Justice Singers and final remarks, the rally headed to the Ombudsman Office where Willy Noiles and Sang Hun Mun delivered the message that injured workers need an investigation now.  Read ONIWG Dec 12 2016 letter to the Ombudsman

  • Similar rallies were held elsewhere across the province including Thunder Bay – “Injured workers want inquiry into WSIB: Advocates for injured workers say lack of support placing burden on the taxpayer” / Doug Diaczuk (tbnewswatch Dec. 13, 2016) and Manitoulin – “Frustrated injured workers take their message to steps of the WSIB” (Manitoulin Expositor Dec. 16, 2016)

December 2016 demo flyer1

Filed Under: Actions & Campaigns

Copyright © 2025 Injured Workers Online
  • Accessibility
  • Terms of Use
  • Privacy

The information in this website is for educational purposes only. It is not a substitute for legal advice. For legal advice, see Find legal help