Company fined for scaffold infractions

C.C. Stucco End Plaster Ltd., a Brampton-based stucco and plaster company, has been fined $55,000 for violating scaffolding regulations at a construction site.

BY GRANT CAMERON

STAFF WRITER

C.C. Stucco End Plaster Ltd., a Brampton-based stucco and plaster company, has been fined $55,000 for violating scaffolding regulations at a construction site.

A company supervisor has also been fined $12,000.

Court heard that an inspector from the Ministry of Labour visited a residential construction project at Tenth Line and Baron Drive in Mississauga, Ont., on May 8, 2003, and found that scaffolding installed on the site violated three sections of the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

The inspector found that a 7.3-metre (24-foot-high) scaffold being used by workers employed by C.C. Stucco had no specific entry or exit point and no guardrail.

The planks on the scaffold were not cleated or otherwise secured to prevent them from moving.

There were no injuries or accidents reported at the site.

Following a trial, C.C. Stucco was found guilty, as an employer, of:

— Failing to ensure that access to and egress from a work area located above or below ground level was available by stairs, runway, ramp or ladder, as required by Section 70 (1) of the Regulations for Construction Projects.

— Failing to ensure a guardrail system was provided to a scaffold’s work platform to which a worker had access to an edge, as required by Section 26.3 (1) (4) of the Regulations for Construction Projects.

— Failing to ensure the scaffold’s work platform planks were cleated or otherwise secured against slipping, as required by Section 135 (2) (e) of the Regulations for Construction Projects.

Justice of the Peace John Farnum, of the Ontario Court of Justice in Brampton, fined the company $25,000 on the first count and $15,000 on each of the second and third counts.

The company supervisor was also found guilty of the same offences and was fined $5,000 on the first count and $3,500 on each of the second and third counts.

In addition to the fines, the court imposed a 25-percent victim fine surcharge as required by the Provincial Offences Act.