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To: The Honorable Carla Qualtrough: Ministry of Labour: Minister for Jobs, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion.

Disabled Workers in Canada Seek Section 7 Charter Protection

November 30th, 2020

Hon Carla Qualtrough
Minister of Labour
House of Commons *
Ottawa, Ontario,
Canada
K1A 0A6
Email: [email protected]

Honorable Minister Qualtrough:

Injured, ill and disabled workers have suffered harms seeking fair treatment through administrative justice procedures in Canada for a generation. Law, policy and regulations governing Canada's worker's compensation and safety systems empowers provincial worker's compensation agencies, employers and provincial governments to deny legitimate worker claims for injury and/or illness; physically and psychology suffered by workers in the course of our employment.

Negative outcomes include: imposition of poverty; denial of required professional healthcare services; infliction of psychological harm by way of what's coined sanctuary traumatization; moral injury to worker's families; and in most tragic circumstances, worker death to suicide.

We propose that Provincial/Territorial Workers Compensation Law, Policy and Regulations as drafted and in force today, November 30th, 2020: persist in causing egregious harm to injured, ill, and/or disabled Canadians and by proxy to our families.

We further propose, that as law, policy and regulations are drafted with clear intent to favor compensation agencies, employers and governments: Canadian workers are disempowered when consequences of workplace accidents and exposure result in our need for financial compensation for healthcare, retraining, rehabilitation, recovery and in cases of disability, a earnings loss pension and whatever care is needed moving on through our lives.

When expected protection is denied, avenues for redress are effectively blocked. Due to intentionally constructed language in law, policy and regulations that impedes our timely access to receipt of appropriate justice: struggling for some lasts our remaining life-times.

Injustice demands Justice. Restorative Justice that wrongs are expressed and corrected for.

We believe that the Federal Minister for Jobs, Workforce Development and Disability Inclusion is the appropriate representative of the the Government of Canada to whom we raise these concerns.

This is not an official petition; rather, this letter intends to gather as many signatures as possible for purposes of exploration. We do so as those provisions in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms allow.

We are seeking our Government of Canada's protection. As we begin this campaign, we're informed that thousands of Canadian Workers have suffered such egregious violation of rights for over a generation. In British Columbia, this letter represents 280 BC abandoned workers.

We call on the Minister to proactively intervene. These matters demand a National Public Inquiry be initiated in due course by the Government of Canada, which is what we've written you to request.

We await any reply with united resolve.

Respectful Regards,

Darren Michael Gregory
5474 Cory Road
Wynndel BC V0B 2N1
November 30th, 2020

Why is this important?

The purpose of the inquiry we request is to determine the extent of harms put upon injured, ill and/or disabled Canadians in provincial and territorial jurisdictions nationally.

We raise these concerns to ensure as well our own full and fair redress in the form of workers compensation benefits as we are entitled to receive and rightly, legitimately deserve.

We believe that only with a National investigation of provincial law, policy and regulations that govern provincial/territorial occupational health and safety can troubling issues be properly rectified.

Those agencies and agents so empowered by law, policy and regulations have not responded to our direct engagement to address these issues with integrity.

As these issues are of long-standing national concern, we assert that the concerns receive the attention that these matters require as it is in the National interests of all Canadians to do so.

How it will be delivered

This letter will be delivered to the Minister by Email at the close of this campaign.

Links

Updates

2020-12-14 01:50:34 -0500

December 14th
An Article from December 4th, 2020.

"Families of three rail workers killed in a crash in the Rockies of eastern B.C. almost two years ago are calling on the prime minister to intervene after a former Canadian Pacific Railway police officer alleged his superiors obstructed his investigation.

This week, relatives launched a petition and video appeals to Justin Trudeau asking for an independent investigation into the crash of CP Train 301. They also want an end to Canada's two largest railways running their own corporate police forces.

"I'm begging you, prime minister," says Ethel Nesbitt, grandmother of deceased conductor Dylan Paradis, in the video campaign produced by the rail workers union. "I don't have much time left on this earth to fight for the truth. But I do feel I'd have failed Dylan if we don't get something done and cleared up."

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/families-of-rail-workers-call-for-action-1.5827464

2020-12-14 00:44:54 -0500

https://www.facebook.com/darren.gregory.39/posts/10224014293493231

2020-12-13 23:57:36 -0500

December 14th, 2020
Disabled Workers in Canada
Seek Section 7 Charter Protection | Leadnow.ca

https://you.leadnow.ca/petitions/disabled-workers-in-canada-seek-section-7-charter-protection

“The government is in the business of facilitating toxic employers to willfully damage their workers health and then refuses those disabled workers their Disability and Workers Compensation benefits.”

“Expect to be mistreated by Workers Compensation.”

“Anyone that has been through the Disability System or Workers Compensation for occupational diseases and been denied their eligible benefits knows that the social security system is blatantly rigged.”

2020-12-13 23:57:19 -0500

2). “It was an awareness of the frauds that Disability and Workers Compensation have become that turned me into a civil rights advocate for the disabled.”

“The government is in the business of ruining the lives of the majority of the disabled.”

“I am a victim of government corruption.”
~ Steven Magee

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/article-as-employment-in-canada-continues-to-struggle-its-disabled-folks-who/

2020-12-13 23:53:01 -0500

Keep The Wolves Away
(A Story of Worker Disability).
Uncle Lucius

"Took my first breath, where the muddy Brazos, spills into the gulf of Mexico. Where the skyline's colored by chemical plants, t'put bread on the table of the working man.

Where the working man does his best to provide, safety and shelter for kids and a wife. Given little love n soul every day, making over time to keep the wolves away."

2020-12-13 23:52:08 -0500

"Well I was barely thirteen when the company man, tried to dig my daddy's grave. It happened on a French owned tanker ship, spilling poison in the Galveston Bay.

Where the liquid fire filled his lungs and his eyes, silenced any mortal cries. Cold and the grip of death stinging pain, he fought like hell to keep the wolves away."

2020-12-13 23:47:28 -0500

"For the next few years dad was sick as a dog, but he made a recovery just to spite the odds. Settlement came and we moved out of town, where the sky isn't heavy with refinery clouds.

Yeah he's still alive he's doing good he's in his fifties. But the moneys running out, and he's pinching for pennies. So goin' for broke with every song I've made, 'cos now it's my turn to keep the wolves away."

Source: LyricFind
Songwriters: Kevin O'Neil Galloway
Keep The Wolves Away
lyrics © Ole Media Management
https://youtu.be/pYdvxBxHX2U

2020-12-13 01:23:00 -0500

December 12th, 2020
DMG

Federal-Provincial-Territorial Ministers Meeting.
Collaborative Action to Uphold Human Rights (protection) in Canada Still Lacking.
Amnesty International Canada.
November 12th, 2020.

"Canada’s haphazard and ineffectual approach to intergovernmental coordination in implementing human rights obligations is of twofold concern. First, it is clearly a serious problem domestically, as it undermines efforts to address grave and longstanding human rights violations. Second, it means that Canada’s global human rights diplomacy is weakened, making it impossible for our diplomats to encourage other nations to take steps that we have failed to take ourselves."

https://www.amnesty.ca/news/federal-provincial-territorial-ministers-meeting-collaborative-action-uphold-human-rights

2020-12-12 21:21:09 -0500

December 12th, 2020
DMG

Human Rights Protection in Canada/ The Charter of Rights and Freedoms Must Come of Age.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/human-rights-protection-canada-charter-freedoms-must-come-gregory/

2020-12-12 19:58:35 -0500

December 12th, 2020
DMG
7 High-Risk Professions That Can Lead to PTSD

"Certain professions are associated with a high risk for the development of PTSD. High-risk professions are generally designated as professions that have significant proportions of individuals developing trauma-related disorders such as PTSD. These include military occupations, firefighters, and more. Continue reading to learn more about traumatic events and which other professions are considered to have a high risk of exposure to these events."
~ Amanda Lautieri, American Addiction Centers

https://deserthopetreatment.com/co-occurring-disorders/ptsd/high-risk-professions/

2020-12-11 20:45:11 -0500

December 11th, 2020.
DMG

LSLAP Manual: Workers' Compensation

"This chapter on workers' compensation is from the manual used by law students handling cases at the LSLAP program's legal clinics. It provides an overview of the law relating to compensation for workplace injuries or illness, and describes the claims and appeal procedure."

https://www.lslap.bc.ca/uploads/2/9/3/5/29358111/lslap_manual_ch_7_-_workers_compensation.pdf

2020-12-10 23:33:06 -0500

December 10th, 2020
International Human Rights Day
Disability in a Human Rights Context
Theresia Degener
August 25th, 2016

"Human dignity is the anchor norm of human rights. Each individual is deemed to be of inestimable value and nobody is insignificant. People are to be valued not just because they are economically or otherwise useful but because of their inherent self-worth…The human rights model (of disability) focuses on the inherent dignity of the human being and subsequently, but only if necessary, on the person’s medical characteristics. It places the individual center stage in all decisions affecting him/her and, most importantly, locates the main “problem” outside the person and in society."

https://www.mdpi.com/153360

2020-12-10 18:54:52 -0500

“The notion that “the best and the brightest” are better at governing than their less-credentialed fellow citizens is a myth born of meritocratic hubris.”
~ Michael Sandel, 'The Tyranny of Merit'.
https://policymagazine.ca/merit-and-the-hubris-of-elitism/

2020-12-10 18:41:28 -0500

December 10th, 2020

1). A few months back, an attorney in BC showed interest in our plight. I contacted him at the time and since then I kept him in mind. As this campaign started coming together, I reached out to him again. He offered a consultation and set things up for contact with his office.

2020-12-10 18:41:05 -0500

2). I called today. The appointment is scheduled for January 6th, 2021 at 10am. With the call today, I informed his assistant that in BC there are 280 with me who need this same attention. As well, I informed the assistant that we've determined that there are thousands across Canada who've suffered the same abuses as we have in BC with our systems.