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This assessment was prepared for the Ontario Public Service Employees Union. It examines the conditions of work in the offices of the Ontario Disability Support Program. I was asked by the Union to assess the extent to which the organization of work by the Employer makes reasonable provision for the health and safety of staff and to offer recommendations, if any, arising out of my assessment. The assessment provides evidence in support of the union's claim that "The employer is failing to make reasonable provisions for the health of its employees in the ODSP by failing to maintain sufficient staff to handle the workload required of its staff." --Introduction
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This assessment was prepared for the Ontario Public Service Employees Union. It examines the conditions of work at the Don Jail. I was asked by the union whether under-staffing and the resulting levels of overtime represented a health risk and to offer recommendations, if any, arising out of my assessment. The assessment provides evidence in support of the union's claim that long hours of work represent a potential health risk to the staff of the Don Jail.
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I) Objective: The study aimed to explore the health effects of precarious employment relationships in Ontario, and understand how various forms of support shape health. II) Methods: Three measures make up our "Employment Strain" model: employment relationship uncertainty; employment relationship effort; and, employment relationship support. This new framework was used to measure the characteristics of precarious employment and their effect on health using data from a structured, self-administered, population-based survey completed by 3,244 workers, and 82 semi-structured interviews using a stratified sampling technique to select participants. III) Results: Precarious employment has negative health consequences for many workers. However, the relationship between precarious employment and health is complex, whereby the characteristics of the employment relationship and levels of support determine health outcomes. Using the "Employment Strain" framework, we found that workers exposed to High Employment Strain - workers with high levels of employment relationship uncertainty and high levels of employment relationship effort - have poorer health. Importantly, support does shapes health and can help to buffer the health risks associated with precarious employment.
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This report compares work organization and workload at three [Ontario] developmental service agencies in order to identify factors that precipitate and contribute to injuries, stress and health problems in the social services. The restructuring of services in this sector has resulted in reduced funding and therefore workloads and health risks associated with overwork and burnout appear to have increased dramatically in all three sites studied. Restructuring has also exposed workers and clients to higher levels of stress and violence. This study also uncovered serious incidents of workplace bullying and traumatic work cultures. While workplace bullying certainly predates restructuring, some studies show that it is a phenomena that has seen rapid growth within the context of restructured public sector and non profit workplaces. Given the serious under funding of this sector it may appear that there is little that can be done to improve health and safety in the short term. However, this report recommends several measures including an immediate increase in government funding, the incorporation of worker’s knowledge into how work is to be organized and planned, guarantees to part-time workers of enough hours of work to support themselves, an end to the use of split shifts, a cap on overtime and subsequent hiring additional fulltime staff in order to ensure workplace stability and the introduction of immediate, assertive, transparent measures to improve workplace morale and eradicate traumatic workplace cultures. --Executive Summary