Health & Safety Night in Canada (Editorial)

Hockey's visor debate shows how unions can fail to drive home the safety message, says Canadian HR Reporter's managing editor John Hobel

Not since Jacques Plante decided he’d had enough pucks to the face and donned the first goalie mask in the middle of a 1959 NHL game, has hockey equipment caused such a stir. Forty-five years after Plante struck a blow for workplace health and safety and literally changed the face of goaltending, the league is in the midst of a brouhaha about players wearing visors. CBC hockey commentator Don Cherry has even turned it into a language row, with comments about French-Canadian “sucks” who wear visors. Only in Canada, eh?

People don’t always think of hockey as a worksite, but it is. And it suffers from the same health and safety problem many worksites do. Substitute “visors” with “hard hats” or “goggles” and you have a situation that plays itself out across the country — be it a sports arena or a construction site. Too many men think wearing proper safety equipment is inconvenient, uncomfortable and wimpy. Rooted in laziness and machismo, it’s an attitude that results in preventable injuries and ends careers and lives.

Back in 1959, Plante took a lot of heat from fans, coaches, league officials and players about wearing a mask, and was even coerced into taking it off once. Despite backstopping the Montreal Canadiens to five successive Stanley Cups and winning the top goalie award seven times in his career, he had to defend wearing a mask. (Yes, Don, another French-Canadian wimping out.)

This latest visor issue has the NHL in a dilemma about making their use mandatory, after a pair of Toronto Maple Leafs suffered serious eye injuries. This heats up every few years after someone gets a stick in the retina. Cherry criticized visor wearers during a segment of Hockey Night in Canada in which he blamed Europeans and French-Canadians for wearing them. Following Cherry’s remarks came word that Ottawa’s Commissioner of Official Languages was investigating. It’s the commissioner’s job to ensure the federal government and it agencies, including the CBC, treat minority languages with respect.

The commissioner may be a bit off base — French-Canadians should consider Cherry’s remarks as a compliment rather than an insult. He’s in fact saying that, unlike francophone hockey players, English-speaking Canadians are too stupid, or macho, or both to properly protect themselves. So if Cherry owes anyone an apology, it’s English-speaking Canada.

The visor debate also shows how unions can fail to drive home the safety message. Robert Goodenow, executive director of the NHL Players’ Association, said he “respects” the fact players want a choice whether or not to wear a visor. Can you imagine saying that about hard hats on a construction site? Instead of insisting on mandatory visor use, the NHLPA has deferred to some of its members and essentially allowed more players to get poked in the eye.

You’d think safety is the one place unions would consistently line up with management, but no. Ask any HR professional who has tried to discipline a union member over a safety infraction and you’ll find out how fast the word “grievance” pops up. If employers are to get tougher about enforcing safety, so too must unions.

In Canada hockey is more than a game, it’s a part of the nation. And the part that doesn’t put safety first needs to change.

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