Criminal charges needed in 2011 Vale mine deaths: OFL

Company ignored documented concerns, violated safety standards, federation says

The Ontario Federation of Labour (OFL) is criticizing the criminal justice system for failing to bring criminal charges against Vale Canada and its executives for the 2011 deaths of two miners in Vale's Stobie Mine in Sudbury, Ont.

"When a company's negligence causes worker deaths, a crime has been committed, but when the judicial system fails to prosecute that company criminally, a second crime has been committed," said OFL president Sid Ryan. "Even a $1 million fine for regulatory infractions is a miscarriage of justice when the Vale bosses responsible for putting profit ahead of worker safety are allowed to walk free."

In letters sent to Ontario's Attorney General and Minister of Community Safety and Correctional Services, the OFL is demanding answers as to why the Canadian managers of Brazilian mining giant Vale were not criminally charged for the deaths of two miners buried by a "run of muck" after the company ignored documented concerns and violated safety standards.

While the Sept. 17 sentence made history as the largest total fine ever given for Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act violations, the OFL condemned the judicial system for “failing to uphold the Criminal Code of Canada.” The OFL is calling on Attorney General John Gerretsen to press the crown to lay charges. It Is also demanding that Minister of Community Safety and Correctional Services Madeleine Meilleur use her powers under the Police Services Act of Ontario to impose province-wide directives and guidelines requiring criminal investigations of every workplace tragedy to determine whether employer negligence was at fault.

"It is a cruel irony that Canadian workers have learned that Vale will escape criminal conviction in the same week that a U.K. court set trial dates for a Welsh mine boss and company charged with manslaughter and gross negligence for a 2011 flood in the Gleision mine that claimed the lives of four workers," said OFL secretary-treasurer Nancy Hutchison, a former miner who suffered from occupational disease.

In 2003, the Criminal Code was amended through Bill C-45 to hold employers criminally liable for the deaths of workers. To date, one Ontario company — Metron Construction — has been convicted criminally for a workplace fatality. There have not been any employers sentenced to prison for negligence. Despite what the OFL calls “damning evidence” released by the United Steelworkers (USW) in 2012 showing the deaths of Jason Chenier and Jordan Fram in the Stobie Mine were preventable and Vale had failed to abide by provincial and internal safety requirements, criminal charges have yet to be laid against the company.

When Vale pleaded guilty for health and safety violations, the next step should have been to hold the company and its managers criminally responsible for the fatal result of those shortcuts, said Ryan.

"For Vale, fines are simply the cost of doing business,” he said. “The company is totally unrepentant and went to incredible lengths to bury the facts and cover its tracks.”

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