PrintChanges coming to Alberta Occupational Health and Safety Act
Major changes to Alberta’s Occupational Health and Safety Act will come into effect on June 1, 2018. The changes reflect new laws introduced by the Alberta Government in December 2017 to update the OHS Act and the workers' compensation system. These are the first significant changes to the OH&S Act in more than four decades.
UNA will be highlighting some of these changes over the next week, as they will impact UNA members and members involved with their Local OH&S Committees.
The new act grants employees the right to participate in workplace health and safety and sets out the applicable criteria for payment of wages at the applicable rate of pay for employees involved in workplace OH&S committees.
Time away for committee or representative work and entitlement to pay
30(1) A member of a joint work site health and safety committee
or a health and safety representative is entitled to take the following
time away from the member’s or the representative’s regular
duties:
(a) the period of time that the committee or representative
determines is necessary to prepare for each committee
meeting or meeting with the employer or prime contractor
as applicable;
(b) the time required to attend each meeting of the committee,
or with the employer or prime contractor, as applicable;
(c) the time required to attend health and safety training, as
approved by the committee and the employer, or by the
representative’s employer;
(d) such time as the committee or representative determines is
necessary to carry out the member’s or the representative’s
duties as a committee member or representative under this
Act, the regulations and the OHS code.
(2) A member of a joint work site health and safety committee or a
health and safety representative is deemed to be at work during the
times described in subsection (1) and is entitled to be paid for those
times by the member’s or the representative’s employer at the
member’s or representative’s applicable rate of pay.
