What Constitutes ‘Reasonable Precautions’? 3 Cases That Help Define the Term
The legislation isn't clear, but court decisions give us some clues
Hey there, welcome to this week’s edition of Safety Pro Weekly.
This week I want to take a look at a clause that exists in Occupational Safety Acts in every jurisdiction in Canada. The general duty clause.
For example, in Ontario the clause is in Section 25(2)(h) and states that an employer shall “take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for the protection of the worker.”
A version of this requirement exists in all other jurisdictions in Canada in some form or other.
Unfortunately, the term “reasonable precautions” is not clearly defined in the legislation and is open to interpretation. This leaves many managers, owners and safety professionals in the dark as to what it really means and whether they are meeting their obligations to workers. Or if they are leaving themselves or their business open to a lawsuit or even prosecution.
Key Points at a glance:
Businesses must take all ‘reasonable precautions’ to protect their workers from harm.
While the legislation doesn’t define the term, cases over the years show us what “reasonable precautions’ look like in the eyes of the court.
The best things you can do to demonstrate reasonable precautions are to train your workers, provide competent supervision and document all actions you take to prevent incidents.
On the plus side, while the legislation doesn’t specifically define this term, we can look at how the courts have interpreted this concept through cases over the years. This gives us insight into what the courts view as reasonable precautions in these circumstances.
What the Courts Say
Let’s have a look at 3 cases that help define what “reasonable precautions” really means. The names of the companies and complainants are withheld for privacy reasons.
Case #1: Provide necessary safety equipment and enforce its use.
The incident: 4 construction workers fell to their death when a scaffold collapsed. Two other workers on the scaffold survived as they were using safety lines.
Court’s decision: The employer was negligent for not providing safety equipment required for the job and enforcing its use.
Lesson: Reasonable precautions include actively verifying that workers are trained and using safe procedures.
Case #2: Enforcing your own safety rules
The Incident: 2 firefighters suffered smoke inhalation during a rescue attempt when their SCBA gear malfunctioned.
Court’s decision: The court found the fire department did not follow its own internal tactical plan for the rescue.
Lesson: Written policies aren’t enough — employers must ensure workers are actually following them.
Case #3: Preventing foreseeable hazards
The Incident: An employer was charged due to injuries to a worker working on a temporary platform at a height of 6 feet. Guardrails were not provided. The regulations did not specifically require guardrails at that height, but there was a clear risk to the worker under the circumstances.
Court’s decision: The company failed to take reasonable precautions by not identifying and fixing a known risk, even though the regulations did not specifically require this intervention.
Lesson: Reasonable precautions require proactive steps to prevent foreseeable harm. Adhering strictly to regulations is not always enough.
Why Most Managers Miss the Real ROI of Safety
Hello and Welcome to this week’s edition of Small Business Safety Pro.
How to Apply This to Your Business.
Now that we have learned a bit about what “reasonable precautions” look like, the next step is understanding how you can apply this information to your workplace.
Here are some practical steps you can take to meet the requirements and show you’re taking the necessary steps to protect your workers.
Train.
Make sure your workers are properly trained for the tasks they are asked to perform. Effective training includes both a theoretical and practical component (think written or presented material followed by a demonstration) with a knowledge check to ensure comprehension.
Regular refresher training is critical as well, I’ve talked about how quickly we forget information if it’s not regularly reinforced in other editions of this newsletter.
Supervise.
It’s not enough to simply provide training to your workers and then send them on their way to do the job. The work you do in your business must be supervised by a competent person who has the training, skill and experience to effectively supervise workers.
Providing competent supervision is one of the most important tasks an employer can do. Competent supervisors not only help provide a safe environment, but also ensure quality, productivity and morale stay at levels that support and grow the business.
A key part of effective supervision is checking and confirming that employees are working safely and doing what they need to do. If you just assume that workers know what they’re supposed to do because they’ve done it before, you’re taking a huge risk.
Document.
Perhaps I should say, document, document, document. This step is critically important. From the point of view of a government inspector, if something wasn’t documented, it didn’t happen. Often the best defense against a lawsuit or charges when things go wrong is documented evidence that the necessary steps were taken. If you don’t accurately document training, safety meetings, hazard assessments or preventative maintenance, you leave yourself open to legal repercussions.
It’s important to note that “reasonable” also implies that you’ve taken proactive steps to prevent accidents, not just reactive ones. If an incident occurs, you’ll need to show you assessed the risk ahead of time and took significant efforts to prevent it.
That’s it for this week’s edition of Safety Pro Weekly.
On a quick note, for those who missed the announcement, we have a new title next week as I continue to tweak this newsletter to provide the greatest value to the greatest number of people. Since over 90% of subscribers to this newsletter are safety professionals, I made the minor change to better cater to you, my audience.
As always, if you’d like help crafting thought leadership articles to help demonstrate your credibility and position yourself as an expert in your field, send me a message and we’ll set up a free consultation.
Cheers,
Dan.