Mr. Speaker, I also invite my colleagues to reflect on the tragic situation of so many workers whose life totally changed one day, when they had an accident in the workplace or they learned they were permanently and irrevocably affected by a work-related illness.
How many people have experienced real dramas, not only in personal physical and moral suffering, but also in suffering because of the divisions this may have caused afterwards in their family, over and above the impoverishment and the battles fought, often with the system? Yes, we must state firmly that accidents in the workplace and industrial illnesses must be vigorously fought.
History has shown us that only legislation could effectively give the basic framework, but this legislation does not reach all workers.
There are not enough inspectors and businesses may not know how very quickly an accident can happen or how much a gas, heat and stress can cause irreversible damage to many people.
Experience has shown the only effective way to fight the effects of laxness is to give the workers themselves, in co-operation with businesses, the instruments needed to control their own workplace. This then implies they have the means to know if their workplace is bad for their health, something we do not talk about enough, and also the means to change what is dangerous in the workplace.
Having long worked in this area, I have trouble accepting that responsibility is being put on the workers. I think that, over the years, tribunals and courts have been clear about businesses' responsibility. When a business hires someone to ask him to do a job it benefits from, its responsibility is involved. It seems to me the duty of all members of the House is to ensure the responsibility applies not only after an accident or an illness, but it must be understood prevention is an obligation.
This year's motto is training. I hope training will promote prevention among workers as well as within the work organization.
I take this opportunity to invite the government, which has the necessary means, to use its political leadership to remind businesses of their responsibilities.