Peel District School Board fined $50,000 after student injured in 2014
Posted January 14, 2016 4:46 pm.
Last Updated January 14, 2016 5:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
The Peel District School Board has been fined $50,000 after pleading guilty to an incident which led to a student being injured in a Mississauga classroom.
In April 2014, three students at Rick Hansen Secondary School were in a manufacturing program class when they were told to move four old caster wheels from a table. Officials said that a 450-pound metal industrial shear, which had been brought to the school by the teacher without the knowledge of the school administration, was laying on the table unsecured.
The three students were instructed by the teacher to cut off and replace the table leg. As the students attempted to lower the table down to see how the new caster fit, the sheer slid off the table, landing on the back of one of the students who was crouched down by the table’s legs.
The student was rushed to hospital with a fracture.
According to the Ministry of Labour, the three students did not know that the shear was not secured to the work table and at no time did their teacher instruct them to remove the shear from the table before cutting off the table legs.
PDSB pleaded guilty to failing as an employer to take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for the protection of a worker in a workplace – specifically to failing to take the reasonable precaution of ensuring that the shear was secured to the surface upon which it was set.
The court also imposed a 25 per cent victim fine surcharge as required by the Provincial Offences Act.
