We are pleased to announce the details of this year's Health and Safety Caucus to be held in conjunction with the May Area Coordinator Conferences (ACCs). The design of the workshop is based the new Ontario Musculoskeletal Disorders (MSD) Prevention Guideline and Toolbox, a key resource for MSD prevention.

MSDs continue to be the leading cause of workplace injuries and illnesses for ONA members. In 2018, the Ministry of Labour funded the Centre of Research Expertise for the Prevention of Musculoskeletal Disorders (CRE-MSD) to develop the new guideline (resource manual) and a MSD Prevention Tool Box, both which can be found at https://www.msdprevention.com/ . It was a multi-stakeholder initiative including workers, unions, employers, sector associations, Ministry of Labour (MOL), ergonomists, health and safety consultants, and researchers. The new guideline helps employers and workers to understand and recognize MSD hazards, conduct an MSD risk assessment, choose and implement MSD hazard controls and conduct an evaluation.

At the caucus, Brenda Mallat, a Canadian certified professional ergonomist with the Occupational Health Clinics for Ontario Workers (OHCOW), and ONA staff, will facilitate an understanding of how the guideline and tools can assist ONA health and safety leaders in preventing MSDs. In addition, we will have a health and safety legal panel and strategy session regarding MOL inspections. The legal panel will feature Colin Johnson, an Ontario labour arbitrator, and Nicole Butt, ONA's Senior Legal Advisor.

In this Health and Safety (H&S) Caucus, members will be:

• Identifying the opportunities and challenges in recent legal decisions that assist and hinder health and safety activists in holding employers accountable under the Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHSA).
• Identifying strategies used by ONA OHS activists to overcome challenges and achieve good outcomes with MOL inspections.
• Understanding the hazards that cause MSDs in the workplace, the nature of the injuries, the purpose and content of the new MSD provincial guideline, tool box and effective ergonomic prevention programs to eliminate and control MSDs.
• Applying the guideline and online tools to identify hazards, assess MSD risks, eliminate and control MSD hazards in the workplace, including the use of workplace inspections to identify, eliminate, control MSDs, and developing written MSD program recommendations at the Joint Health and Safety Committee (JHSC) to submit to the employer.