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New positions for turbaned employees
04/02/2008
http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/westcoastnews/story.html?id=556e6030-9691-412a-92b9-3c61a222a74b&k=40757
Wednesday, April 02, 2008 - International Forest Products says it has offered to find new positions at identical wages for turbaned employees who have been off the job since a new hard-hat policy was implemented last November.
Interfor vice-president Ric Slaco said the company has been willing to work with its employees to resolve the apparent conflict between a new safety regulation and some baptized Sikh employees who don't want to cover their turbans with hard hats.
Employees Mander Singh Sohal and Kalwant Singh Sahota have filed a human rights complaint of religious discrimination against Interfor because of the new hard-hat rule forcing them from their specific jobs at Interfor's Delta sawmill.
Sohal -- who started with Interfor in 1988 -- has been offered back wages to November and a different job in the receiving department, while Sahota -- who is off on disability leave -- will also be accommodated when he is ready to return to work, Slaco said.
"We have tabled through the union an accommodation offer," he said in an interview Tuesday after The Vancouver Sun revealed details of the human rights complaint.
But David Perry, a lawyer for the two men, said he has not been contacted directly by Interfor with any offer for Sohal and Sahota.
And he said the issue still needs to be resolved by a human rights tribunal so there is a precedent for the entire community and other employers.
Slaco said the stricter hard-hat policy was implemented after a strike ended last November because of health and safety concerns expressed by a number of interested parties.
"We are responding to what we believe is our obligation to provide a safe working environment," Slaco said. "People were expecting us to take measures to increase safety."
And he said other agencies, like WorkSafeBC and the Forest Safety Council, need to weigh in on the apparent conflict between site safety and religious obligation.
"Can you accommodate in any case or is there a priority of one trumping the other?" Slaco asked.
He said the new policy was not intended to offend anyone's religious rights, just to make the company's B.C. sawmills and their 650 workers safer.
"For the most part, the vast majority of people have been willing to comply," he said. "We are not trying to be disrespectful to anyone's religion."
He said only Sohal and Sahota complained about the policy, while other baptized Sikhs have chosen to either wear a hard hat over their turban or remove the turban to accommodate the safety gear.
Slaco said the new hard-hat policy has led to fewer injuries at its sawmills.
"We haven't even had one report of a head injury since we've had the policy," he said.
Slaco could not say how many of its sawmill employees are Sikhs, but said generally there are a large number of Indo-Canadians working at the Metro Vancouver mills, as well as one in Kamloops.
Perry said the employer should have talked to its workers before changing the policy last November.
"They didn't consult with these guys," Perry said. "There are lots of ways this can be resolved."
Sohal and Sahota held a news conference Tuesday with a number of community supporters at Vancouver's Ross Street temple.
Perry said the two men feel it is important to go forward with the complaint for workers who might find themselves in the same situation.
"What does that say about somebody else trying to get a job there or about somebody else not covered by this accommodation or a different mill?" Perry said. "They want to be able to have a public space to exercise their religious rights."
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© The Vancouver Sun 2008
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