The regulations that govern our lives in the hazardous materials industry, and you will find a number that should terrify every single worker, every union rep, and every lawmaker in this country is 2,000 hours.

Under the current rules, an abatement worker must accumulate 2,000 hours of documented exposure before they are flagged for mandatory medical surveillance.

That is not a safety standard. That is a systemic trap. Its waiting game played with your lungs, your lives, and your families' futures.

Let’s talk about the reality of a carcinogen. This is not a hazard that waits politely for you to hit a milestone on your union dispatch slip. It does not look at your punch clock and say, "Oh, he’s only at 500 hours, I’ll give him a pass." It takes exactly one hour. One tear in a containment. One invisible plume of dust. A single microscopic fiber inhaled on your very first day is enough to trigger a terminal diagnosis twenty years down the line.

Telling a worker they need 2,000 hours of exposure before a doctor looks at their lungs is like telling a soldier they need to survive a hundred firefights before they are issued a medic. It should be illegal. Medical surveillance must be compulsory from the moment you step foot onto a site. Prior medical and Work completed medical.

The industry will point to our PPE. They will hold up our respirators and our Tyvek suits and tell the public, "They are protected." But anyone who actually does this heavy, grueling work knows the truth: the gear is not 100 percent.

Seals break. Filters get compromised. Sweat, exhaustion, and the physical reality of tearing down a building in a contaminated, high-heat environment mean that perfection is a myth. PPE is our last line of defense, but the industry treats it like an invincible shield so they can justify keeping us in the dark about our internal health.

And what about the equipment we are relying on to clear that air? Look at the technology we are forced to use here in Canada. We are a G7 nation, supposedly a global leader, yet our abatement sites are running on outdated, archaic machinery. If you look at the containment tech, the negative air units, and the decontamination setups used in other developed nations right now, it is night and day. They are using advanced, automated particulate monitoring and modern ventilation systems. We are using outdated exhaust fans and duct tape, hoping it holds. 

We are doing the most dangerous work in the country, using yesterday’s technology, and being denied today’s medical care.

This is about basic human rights on the job site. The "Ghost Worker" era needs to end. We cannot allow employers to use the 2,000-hour rule to cycle through unmonitored labor, burning through workers before they ever hit the threshold for a medical exam.

We need compulsory medical surveillance from the first job. We need modernized equipment that matches the actual danger of the materials we are handling. And we need a system that recognizes that our lives are worth more than a line item on a demolition budget.

Thank you.