By Gerald
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Little doubt that this is going to cost the Ontario WSIB billions of dollars to rehear long standing claims and then provide compensation to the thousands of workers whose claims and benefits were illegally denied. The ripple effect of this also will affect workers in Alberta and as well as other provincial governments whose claims and benefits were denied based on pre-existing conditions. Of note is that the issue is specific to the NEL (non economic loss) in Ontario and a NELP (non economic loss payment) in Alberta which is a separate discretionary award based on impairment ratings.
While the problem and subsequent blame involving apportionment is being blamed on Dr. Chris Brigham who is a friend of mine (Dr. Brigham was the Senior Editing Chair of the AMA Guides 6th Edition) who was basically doing what the “Guides” direct. Apportionment is used when there is a pre-existing condition and a compensable condition when the pre-existing condition is subtracted from the compensable condition to reach a whole person impairment. Being that workers compensation is based on a medicolegal scenario, by law using the thin skull rule, workers should not have their impairments apportioned as opposed to in the field of medicine, there must be apportionment.
The former Conservative Government after the review by Doerkson and Friedman reports enacted Section 157 .1 of the WCA to hear long standing claims which due to lobbying by the Alberta Chamber of Commerce suggesting that the decisions made by the long standing Review Panels would not change appreciably which I beg to differ. If all long standing claims were reheard by competent Review Panel members such as I, over 90% of the claims and benefits that were denied would be overturned. According to the Alberta Chamber of Commerce, the cost to review long outstanding claims would be approximately 4 million dollars which I also disagree with. The cost would most likely result in hundreds of millions dollars or billions of dollars going to workers who have been cheated from receiving benefits by WCB and the Appeals Commission and the latest news from Ontario would certain support my estimate of the cost. Unfortunately in Alberta we have no lawyers, worker advocates who are experts in worker compensation law and medicine so we have to wait for lawyers in other provinces to establish precedence.Lawyers and worker advocates in Alberta take advantage of desperate workers who use much needed money for food, lodging and care of workers children and make these workers believe that they are experts in law and medicine, take their money and then leave the worker and their families destitute. The blame for all of this is the provincial governments who aid and abet criminal fraud against the most vulnerable people, workers who put their lives on the line every day of the year trying to earn an honest dollar. These are the real heroes in our society, not just first responders who get all of the limelight.
