WSIB CORRUPTION

Well let's be a little more specific. The Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) used to be known as the Workman's Compensation Board (WCB). Whether an independent board or not I suspect that they are still under some sort of observation or supervision from the Ontario Ministry of Labour. Similarly the Ministry of Labour are represented in our provincial Cabinet by the Minister of Labour. So to call the WSIB corrupt I'm basically saying that our Ministry of Labour and our provincial government are corrupt. Good news though, you can't lay this at the feet of Doug Ford. All those bodies were corrupt long before he came along.

Liz Witmer, former Progressive Conservative Cabinet Minister, is the head of the WSIB. Not a bad "retirement" appointment is it? How she managed to stay on with the Liberals in power for so long, I really don't know unless they were as equally corrupt as the PCs and felt that she would continue to keep WSIB payouts in check.

Now to the present. Two days ago the Waterloo Region Record published the following front page story titled, "WSIB had flagged rubber cases as disease cluster." Holy crap! E-mails have been found through a Freedom of Information request that show that the WSIB many years ago knew that rubber workers were among a group of five sectors in the province who formed clusters of occupational diseases. The five sectors are firefighters, herbicide sprayers, miners exposed to McIntyre Powder, and General Electric workers (likely in Peterborough) as well as rubber workers.

So let me get this straight. Our WSIB, Ministry of Labour, and provincial Cabinet have known for perhaps twenty years or more that there are five sectors of workers who are at extremely high risk of developing occupational diseases. That kind of puts a new light on the Horticultural Technologies fire here in Kitchener some thirty years ago, now doesn't it? Firefighters who worked that fire have been dropping like flies with different cancers since then.

Back to the guilty parties. Why did they not inform the public as to the risks they and their loved ones were taking working in those sectors? Why did they insist that each and every rubber worker had to prove their sickness was caused by working in one of our local rubber factories when the facts are long known that those factories and their products caused cancers and much more? Why of the five sectors are only the firefighters given special status and don't have to prove that their jobs caused their diseases?

The answers are painful but obvious. Money and power. Our government has the power and they wanted to spend taxpayers money elsewhere rather than on assisting critically ill rubber workers. Shame on the WSIB, Ministry of Labour and both Liberal and Progressive Conservative governments. You are corrupt, self-serving liars of the worst kind who hold other people's lives as valueless.

JUSTICE SYSTEM BULLIES THRIVE IN THE PLAYGROUND FOR THE RICH

What an exquisite deal. Regional politicians are in charge of several appointments to the Waterloo Region Police Services Board (WRPB). Same politicians decide who the regional politicians are who will sit on this Board. Regional councillor Tom Galloway has been the Chair of the WRPB for many years. Yes the province have a couple of appointees they put on the Board. Hell they might even throw in the odd token progressive or free thinker. Every regressive, status quo oriented committee or board needs one or two as long as they are vastly in the minority. Meanwhile where the hell are the public announcements in the news media ahead of time telling the public when and where the next allegedly public meeting is? I have been looking for and never finding those announcements.

Several former police officers, mostly female, have sued the Waterloo Region Police Services (WRPS) and WRPB. Kelly Donovan has written a book about both the WRPS and other Ontario police services. Where the hell is the ongoing news media coverage of that lawsuit? Is our local police force going to continue forever being non-transparent and unaccountable to the public who pay their way? Will the WRPS and WRPB continue using taxpayers money to silence, bully and intimidate either former officers or the general public any time the public decide to criticize police behaviour and actions? Courts are the bread and butter of liars and cowards with money, especially liars and cowards with their hands in the public cookie jar in order to finance their assaults upon truth.

CIVILIZED CORRUPTION IN CANADA

There is third world corruption such as in Syria, Saudia Arabia, Brazil and many other countries around the world. That style of corruption is accompanied by state sanctioned, whether tacit or explicit, murder, mayhem and torture. Then we have the U.S. and Canadian styles of corruption. By corruption I simply mean bending, breaking or circumventing of the rules of doing business or politics in a country. It is also includes in my opinion a fleecing of the millions of unempowered everyday citizens who are simply trying to make a legal living for themselves and their families. This fleecing can be via taxes, fraud or even legal means in which citizens are grossly overcharged for goods and or services.

SNC-Lavalin are in the news currently. They've been caught, not for the first time, allegedly handing out bribes to foreign governments in an attempt to sell their products. Somehow either through pure good luck or possibly as a direct result of political donations, they got Canadian law changed last year allowing "remediation agreements" in place of prosecution for some offences. Now they are trying to collect on this new law in order to avoid prosecution for alleged corruption offences that occurred in Libya. Wow!

But it gets much worse. It turns out that SNC-Lavalin have been lobbying both the federal government as well as opposition parties trying to get off the hook. This lobbying pressure has been passed down the line to the now departed Attorney General. She refused to play ball and next thing you know our Prime Minister fired and demoted her to Veterans Affairs Minister. The best description of that portfolio I've ever heard is that it is the department where political careers go to die. The point is that firing and demotion pretty much satisfies the definition of undue pressure. It indicates that our legal system is at the whim or mercy of politicians, rather than being independent. This is true Canadian corruption at its finest. Laws are only for the little people. Laws are there to serve the interests of the big people not to constrain their interests or behaviour. Shameful and hypocritical.

WOOLWICH TOWNSHIP IN COURT NEXT WEEK

The address is 85 Frederick St. which I believe is the newest court house (ie. Superior Court). Ha! Believe me there is nothing superior about it except perhaps the cost to taxpayers. Regarding scheduling for example, the parties have been advised that yes they have a court date for next week. They will be informed later this week as to which day, what time and which courtroom. Pretty superior isn't it?

So what's the beef? Well the owner bought a pig in a poke. Along with the former Paleshi garage and auto wrecking yard it seems that he bought a methane problem. Oh and he also bought a chunk of land that after the fact he's being ordered around by Woolwich as to what he can and can not do on his property. For example he's being told that he can't drive over a piece of his own land. Nor can he change the landscaping in any fashion near the east side of his property. All this because Woolwich Township have an illegal buried municipal waterline through his property. I refer to it as illegal because gosh darn it the municipality forgot to ever get an easement for it. That's right it was installed about three owners ago and isn't marked on the deed. The owner previous to Mr. Rattasid ( ie. Mr Paleshi) claims that he didn't know about the waterline being installed prior to his ownership of the land.

There are other problems such as Woolwich Township advising Mr. Rattasid that there no longer was methane present when he purchased the property. This of course was based upon inadequate Conestoga Rovers (CRA) reports on behalf of the township. The township had actually removed the methane collection system prior to Mr. Rattasid's purchase of the property. This was premature and if Woolwich had been doing their due diligence and carefully reading the CRA reports they would have known that. The thirty-five year history of those studies and reports has been totally inadequate and in my opinion incompetent. Now Woolwich again want access to his land to rebuild a methane collection system that if done properly decades ago would have long resolved the problem of explosive levels of methane gas on the property as well as threatening neighbour's properties.

Through all of this Mr. Rattasid has been willing to discuss and negotiate as equals with the township in regards to permitting their continued excursions on his land to fix the problem of methane arising from the former municipal Bolender Park Landfill. As part of this process of granting access to his land he would like something in return. To date the township have decided that they would rather fight to the last taxpayers dollars then to sit down and discuss/negotiate in good faith with Mr. Rattasid. In good faith includes being truthful about the facts surrounding this site and the landfill itself.

AN ABUSE OF TAXPAYERS MONEY - SLAPP SUITS BY PUBLIC INSTITUTIONS

The Waterloo Region District School Board has done it. Likely at least one of our municipalities have tried it. Now the Waterloo Region Police Board are doing it. A class action lawsuit was filed against them a couple of years back regarding their treatment of female police officers. The blue wall really is only about the boys in blue. The allegations in the lawsuit describe various despicable actions by male police officers, generally those of higher ranks although not exclusively.

Kelly Donovan, a former police officer, has challenged them and taken them to court. Her allegations have been supported by many other female officers as well as by some senior male officers. Despite this the Police Board have filed a suit against Kelly Donovan
alleging that she has broken her resignation agreement. It also appears that the Police Board are using some sort of legal loophole to get around recent amendments (2015) to Ontario's Libel laws. This is shameful behaviour when public institutions break the laws in the first place by harassing and discriminating against employees and then turn around and use public funds for over the top legal SLAPP suits. SLAPP stands for Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation.

Instead of a long overdue housecleaning at the top, we the taxpayers are facing the spectre of those in charge hiding behind both taxpayers money and the courts in order for them to misbehave with impunity. This has to end. Senior police management along with the Police Services Board and our local regional politicians are debasing the reputations of many fine and professional rank and file police officers by their circle the wagons and bury their heads in the sand approach to this long standing issue.

IT"S 'S' NO JOKE: A PLAGIARIZED TITLE

O.K. so the somewhat plagarized title comes from an article by Luisa D'Amato in today's Waterloo Region Record. The full title of her opinion piece is 'S'no joke: City adds insult to injury on sidewalk snow." Firstly I agree this is not my normal topic for this Blog. Oh heck I'm doing it regardless.

Ms. D'Amato has related an incident earlier in the week when a woman phoned the City of Kitchener to complain that the snow plough had thrown a lot of snow onto her freshly shovelled sidewalk. She had done her civic duty and more by cleaning it and didn't appreciate the city making her do a legally mandated chore twice. She was advised that she was still obligated to reclean the sidewalk although a city route supervisor could come out and inspect and he or she would determine if there was too much snow for the homeowner to remove again. Quoting Ms. D'Amato "What unbelievable gall for a municipality to not only order property owners to clean up city-owned sidewalks but also to threaten it may force the property owner to clear them again after the city made a mess."

I agree with Ms. D'Amato on this matter. I also agree that in my opinion the law really is tenuous on this matter of demanding that the non-owners of the property (sidewalk) must clean those sidewalks upon pain of financial penalty. It is long past time that the cities took over sidewalk shovelling/plowing and left the homeowners to shovel their driveways if they so wish. This is exactly what is done in Elmira and as I live on a corner lot I'm happy about that.

Now let's up the ante. What do you think after a heavy snow when you see the snowplow clean the street by both throwing the snow on the city owned boulevards but also into the end of the sidewalk and into the end of your perhaps freshly shovelled driveway? Imagine now if you have a double driveway and you are a corner lot and the snowplow operator drops his blades literally fifty or sixty metres upstream from you. He comes around the corner of the main street picking up snow, drops a small proportion of it into the end of the sidewalk then proceeds for the next twenty metres picking up more snow only to throw the whole three to four foot high mess into the bottom of your double driveway. Now the snow that was thrown into the end of the sidewalk does get shovelled out by the city sidewalk plow.

You the homeowner are left to deal with the major blockage at the end of your driveway. If the law is going to be used to threaten homeowners then how about this? What about the city being charged with public mischief for blocking the end of your driveway? If they are willing to clear the snow that they have blocked the end of the sidewalk with (in Elmira) then why not use that same plow to clean out the end of my driveway a scant twenty metres away? To me this is an obvious case of preventing a homeowner from enjoying the use of his property. How well can you use your property if you can neither access it or depart from it? How dangerous is it for elderly citizens (like me) to be blocked into our homes by the city owned snowplow?