A new WSIB guideline and policy regarding mental injury claims will set workers back decades

Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) policy to set workers with mental disabilities back decades.

Earlier this year, the Ontario provincial government passed new laws permitting workers with mental disabilities to make WSIB claims. They were previously entirely excluded from making such claims, but such exclusion were ruled to be unconstitutional.

Now, the WSIB has created its own guidelines on how to administer the new legislative changes that will set workers with mental disabilities back decades. Workers with mental injuries will be required to meet a new, more stringent test than workers with any other types of injuries. Why?

The WSIB is sending the message that mental injuries are all 'in the head'. Such stigmatizing policies cannot be permitted to stand. We eagerly await a test case to be brought to the courts where hopefully, the judiciary will see fit to strike down the WSIB guidelines that treat people differently for arbitrary and likely unconstitutional reasons.

See: Full Article, By Sara Mojtehedzadeh, The Toronto Star