Ontario Safety Legislation and Workplace Inspections

Workplace inspections help prevent incidents, injuries, and illnesses. Through a critical examination of the workplace, inspections help to identify and record hazards for corrective action. Joint health and safety committees can help plan, conduct, report and monitor inspections. Regular workplace inspections are an important part of the overall occupational health and safety program and management system if present.

 

Identify workplace hazards

 

One of the main purposes of the JHSC is to identify workplace hazards, such as machinery, substances, production processes, working conditions, procedures or anything else that can endanger the health and safety of workers [clause 9(18)(a)]. To a large extent, this purpose is met by carrying out inspections of the workplace. It may obtain and review specified types of information (e.g. information identifying potential or existing hazards) from the employer so that corrective action can be recommended.

 

Unless otherwise required by Regulation or an inspector’s order, the Act requires that a designated member of the committee, who represents workers, inspect the workplace at least once a month. In some cases, this may not be practical. For example, the workplace may be too large and complex to be inspected fully each month. Where it is impractical to conduct monthly inspections, the committee must establish an inspection schedule that will ensure that at least part of the workplace is inspected each month and the entire workplace is inspected at least once a year [subsections 9(26), (27) and (28)].

 

Able Audit comes with over 100 pre-built checklists to help you get started with workplace inspections, or you can use your existing checklists.

 

Learn more about how Able Audit safety inspection features can you help you perform and manage inspections, distribute reports and manage action items.