Workers’ Compensation Act Committee of Review Report with Recommendations

In late 2021, Service Hospitality reached out to many of our largest member organizations, encouraging them to submit feedback to the Workers’ Compensation Act Committee of Review on some key issues affecting them from the Workers’ Compensation Act. Following that review, the committee released a full report with 34 recommendations for improving the workers’ compensation system.

Today, your input is sought further on twelve recommendations, specifically those to do with amendments to the Workers’ Compensation Act.

They include: 

1. Amending the definition of a worker to include students while in their work-based learning program and excluding executive officers. Instead, executive officers would be eligible for voluntary coverage (recommendations one and eight).

2. Increasing the minimum and maximum awards payable for permanent functional impairment (recommendation two).

3. Arranging for and covering the costs associated with transporting a deceased worker’s body back to the home location (recommendation three).

4. Creating a new death benefit to the estate of a deceased worker who has no dependents (recommendation four).

5. Providing equitable compensation to a worker’s dependent children or other dependents regardless of if the injured worker had received benefits for less or more than 24 months before the worker passed away from a non-work-related injury (recommendation five).

6. Amending the privacy provisions to mirror The Health Information Protection Act and to provide for administrative penalties if breach of privacy occurs (recommendations 10, 11 and 12).

7. Improving the medical review panel process by simplifying requirements in the Act (recommendation 27).

8. Clarifying the psychological injury provision to provide quicker supports (recommendation 16).

9. Create a requirement for all decisions to include reasons similar to other tribunals (recommendation 33).

If your organization has further comments, please submit all written responses no later than January 31, 2023, to [email protected]