The Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHSA), and the Education Act both stipulate the responsibilities of district school boards and the role of principals in administering and enforcing the legislation that governs health and safety issues for staff and students.
The OHSA deals exclusively with health and safety issues relating to ”workers.” The principal, as the person “with charge” of a workplace and authority over “workers,” is a “supervisor” under the Act, with specific responsibilities. In addition, principals are also ”workers” themselves and generally entitled to the benefit and protection of OHSA. Where the principal does not have authority over a particular “worker” (e.g. custodians), the supervisory responsibilities under OHSA are sometimes shared with other board personnel; however, notwithstanding this practice of sharing responsibility, as the person “with charge” of the workplace, the principal continues to retain responsibility for the duties of a supervisor under the Act.
As is further discussed under the Work Refusal section of this chapter, it is important to note that OHSA applies to principals, vice-principals and teachers in a manner similar to all other employees except in the area of work refusals. Principals, vice-principals and teachers are not permitted to refuse work where the circumstances are such that the life, health or safety of a pupil is in imminent jeopardy. (R.R.O. 1990, Reg. 857, s. 3.) In contrast, Education Assistants and Early Childhood Educators’ right to refuse work is not fettered in this way.
The Education Act deals with health and safety issues for both school staff and students. Principals are obligated to discharge certain on-site duties as identified in the Education Act and board policy
It is important that the principal review and in-service staff concerning the board’s occupational health and safety policy and procedures. This will be particularly important given the 2010 amendments to OHSA which in turn gave rise to the creation of a new board policy dealing with workplace violence and a revised or new policy dealing with workplace harassment. Each of these policies will have created new responsibilities for principals.
Occupational health and safety board policies and procedures will be numerous and likely to cover topics ranging from smoking on board premises to Workplace Hazardous Materials Information Systems (WHMIS), the system designed to reduce the risk from hazardous products in the workplace which is governed by both federal and provincial laws.
It is also important to review all of the relevant collective agreements for clauses related to occupational health and safety to ensure compliance.
Finally, principals should be familiar with the occupational health and safety representatives, committee members and their inspection/reporting obligations within the school.