TORONTO — Stricter workplace harassment rules has led to the Ontario Trucking Association partnering with Corridor Interactive to deliver training tools for workplace violence and harassment and alcohol and drugs compliance.

These Toolkits are user friendly and meet new governmental requirements that took effect in Ontario this week, says OTA.

The training content for the Workplace Violence Toolkit was authored by recognized experts Glenn French of the Canadian Initiative on Workplace Violence and Dr. Barbara Benoliel of Preferred Solutions.

Effective this week, the Ontario Occupational Health and Safety Act will change, placing on employers significant responsibilities to protect workers from workplace violence and other forms of abuse.

Under the new legislation, employers will be required to have in place a comprehensive violence prevention program that includes a corporate policy on violence/harassment prevention, an organizational risk assessment, reporting and investigation protocols, emergency response measures and training for all employees.

"The OTA recognized that since training was delivered in the mid 1990’s, there may be many new supervisors who are not compliant with the regulated training requirements," says Barb Butler of Barbara Butler and Associates.

"There are others who need to review their responsibilities and procedures to meet them. And distinct from the program for supervisors of regulated drivers, a separate course provides training for supervisors of non-regulated staff."