CHCH
Ontario is set to lower the number of years of employment needed for firefighters to access benefits if they are diagnosed with cancer.
Currently, firefighters must work 25 years in order to qualify for worker’s compensation benefits if diagnosed with esophageal cancer, which has grown to be increasingly common among firefighters due to chemical exposures on the job.
In an announcement expected Wednesday morning in Welland, the government is set to lower that timeline to 15 years.
It came along with another announcement from the province that introduced legislation to support injured workers by “super-indexing” increases to Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB) benefits above the annual rate of inflation.
This means that an injured worker who earns $70,000 a year could see an additional $900 annually on top of cost-of-living adjustments.
For firefighters, it is a move that has been pushed for by the family of Welland Fire Captain Craig Bowman since he died of cancer in May.
Bowman served as a firefighter for 23 years and leaves behind his wife Alison and daughter Alexis without any benefits.
“Alison said … that on her husband’s death bed, he held onto a promise. A promise that we would right this wrong and a promise that we would protect, you know, his family,” David Piccini, Ontario’s Minister of Labour tells CHCH News.
“That promise was made by my predecessor. I put this in our latest piece of legislation for Alison and her family, and all heroic firefighters and their families.”
The benefit expansion will be retroactive to 1960, according to government officials.