The Canadian Injured Workers Alliance (CIWA) is a national network of injured workers groups that aims to support and strengthen the work of local, provincial, and territorial injured workers groups by providing a forum for exchanging information and sharing experiences. We exist to support injured workers and improve the Occupational Health and Safety of workers across Canada. We believe that injured workers, as individuals, should be in control of their own destinies. In a similar vein, injured workers groups must be democratically controlled by injured workers. We believe that a national organization of injured workers can best achieve these objectives by providing training and educational resources. Through partnerships with injured workers organizations at the provincial and territorial levels, as well as with the trade union movement, CIWA is working to fulfill these objectives. For more information, please contact the Canadian Injured Workers Alliance.

CIWA Office and Mailing Address: 1201 Jasper Drive Thunder Bay, Ontario P7B 6R2

CIWA Digits: Telephone: (807) 345-3429 Toll Free: 1-877-787-7010 Fax: (807) 344-8683

Or you can email us at: ciwa@vianet.ca

    For information on contacting members of our board of directors, visit our contacts page.

  
     CIWA has a number of specific objectives:

work toward a just system of compensation, rehabilitation and re-employment in all provinces and territories of Canada.

provide a national forum for debating issues of concern to injured workers and their organizations at national conferences and at national board workshops (as funding allows).

gather and share information with groups and individuals across Canada.

improve the occupational health and safety of workers in Canada.

identify appropriate educational & training resources within the union movement as well as agencies serving injured workers, and to make these resources available upon request to provincial and local injured workers groups. The emphasis of this material will be on how to organize and maintain effective injured worker groups.

design all of our activities in such a way as to enhance the local base of the injured workers movement.

liase with organizations that represent persons with disabilities and organizations that represent workers to achieve a common goal.

   
    CIWA is a non-profit, registered charitable organization. Your donations help support the activities we engage in throughout the year, such as producing a quarterly newsletter and providing an information and referral service to injured workers across the country and around the world. Without your contributions, these activities would not be possible. The web site you are visiting is another example of our yearly activities. If you like the site, please consider making a donation which will enable us to keep updating and improving the site. Your contribution will help ensure that the content of the site is always refreshed. Should you make a donation to our organization, you will be issued a receipt for income tax purposes. As you know, this will help give you money back when you file this year's return! Thank you in advance for your support! Your generosity is appreciated. Click here to fill out a Donation Form. (Printer friendly).

  
     Injured workers groups have probably been around as long as there have been workers compensation systems in Canada. Being injured at work is much more than a medical event. A worker is faced with an immediate loss of income and self-esteem, and forced to find internal resources to rebuild his or her life. In addition, an injured worker must cope with a compensation system that seems more intent on policing benefit pay-outs than on rehabilitation and restoring the individual to full, productive employment. Faced with this situation, it is only human to seek out those in the same situation, for information, consolation, advice, and perhaps advocacy assistance with the complex bureaucracy of Workers' Compensation Boards.

    Faced with this kind of system, injured workers groups across Canada have been organizing themselves at the local, provincial, and territorial levels for several decades. In Quebec, Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland/Labrador, provincial coalitions have been formed. Over time, specialized service organizations also evolved, such as the legal clinics in Ontario that deal only with Workers' Compensation. Furthermore, there has been a growing level of support from the trade union movement. This has provided additional support for continued organizing beyond the local, provincial, and territorial levels.

    In 1989, a national committee was formed to organize and convene the first national conference of injured worker groups. This committee consisted of Orlando Buonastella, Injured Workers Consultants in Toronto; Andy King, National Health and Safety Representative, United Steelworkers of America; Steve Mantis, Thunder Bay and District Injured Workers Support Group; and Wolfgang Zimmermann, Disabled Forestry Workers of B.C.

    The "National Conference on Re-Employment of Injured Workers" was subsequently convened at the Holiday Inn in Ottawa, June 12 - 15, 1990. The conference examined subjects such as the wage loss system, union attitudes and programs, and the programs available to injured workers not only in Canada, but also in West Germany and Australia. The Conference adopted a number of resolutions including one on the formation of a national network of injured worker organizations.

    The purpose of this network is to:

enhance the provincial organizations.

exchange information.

analyze common trends.

    The national conference then elected the CIWA organizing committee to carry out this mandate. The organizing committee was composed of one representative from each province, except P.E.I. In order to provide continuity, the members of the original committee became advisors to the new organizing committee.

Group Photo of Conference Participants

A video and workbook kit to help injured workers in their quest for re-employment.

An outreach program thats seeks to encourage communities to work with injured workers towards re-building a meaningful life.

Leadership training to help organize local injured workers' groups.

Develop and present workshops on issues of interest to injured workers.

Produce a Newsletter to keep injured workers' groups informed about provincial and national developments that might affect them.

A Youth Project to increase awareness among young people of workplace health and safety and of workers' rights in the workplace.

Public speaking training for injured workers across the country.

Develop a Leadership Manual, to assist injured workers groups in areas of operation.

Act as a resource and referral service to injured workers and others groups.

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