The following statement was given today in the House of Assembly by the Honourable Sherry Gambin-Walsh, Minister of Service NL:

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Mr. Speaker, last week was North American Occupational Health and Safety Week, highlighting the importance of preventing injury and illness in the workplace. 

In trying to make safety a habit, there is no better place to start than with our young workers. I am happy to say that the youth of this province are leading the way when it comes to working safely. In 2017, young workers, aged 15-24 years reported 1.3 lost-time incidents per 100 workers, a rate that is below the provincial rate of 1.5.

To help reduce this rate even more, WorkplaceNL has a number of youth-oriented programs aimed at helping young workers develop positive safety habits early in their careers. One of these programs is an annual radio and video contest, where Grades 7-12 students can demonstrate their safety knowledge.

WorkplaceNL works with the winners to professionally produce the radio ad and use the video to help educate others on workplace injury prevention.

This year the winning radio ad was produced by Kira Clarke and Rebecca Warren of Crescent Collegiate, South Dildo. The winning video was produced by the Villanova Junior High Media Crew from Conception Bay South. The members are: Michael Burke, Sam Collins, Nicole English, Claire Gillingham, Jacob Kavanagh, Eli Paulin, Ben Philpott, Amythest Rodgers, Alex Samson and Sera Tulk. 

Please join me in congratulating the next generation of safety-minded workers.

Thank you, Mr. Speaker.