Kitchener nail manufacturer and CEO fined $100K for OHSA violations
A Kitchener company that manufactures steel nails has been hit with its third conviction in six years for violations of the Occupational Health and Safety Act.
THS Industries Ltd. of Manitou Drive and its director Xiaoye He have been fined a combined $100,000 for failing to take all reasonable care to ensure equipment, materials and protective devices were provided for nail-maker machines. The violation left workers at risk of accessing moving parts inside the machines.
Inspectors from the Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development visited the company’s manufacturing plant in December 2021 after receiving an anonymous complaint that workers were bypassing machine guarding devices on nail-maker machines.
Section 25 of the province’s Regulation for Industrial Establishments states that an in-running nip hazard or any part of a machine, device or thing that may endanger the safety of any worker shall be equipped with and guarded by a guard or other device that prevents access to the pinch point.
The investigation found unfixed access gates on several machines.
In one case, a worker was seen working inside an open access gate of a running machine. In another case, a machine’s lid was open while the machine was running.
Inspectors found that fixed guards had been removed around a significant number of nail-maker machines and at multiple locations on each machine.
There were no injuries, but the lack of a fixed guarding device created access to an in-running nip hazard that could have resulted in serious injuries to a worker.
THS Industries Inc. was fined $85,000 while Xiaoye He, the company’s Chief Executive Officer, was fined $15,000 after both entered guilty pleas at the Ontario Court of Justice in Kitchener.
The court also imposed a 25-percent victim fine surcharge as required by the Provincial Offences Act. The surcharge is credited to a special provincial government fund to assist victims of crime.