N.S. fire chief wants protection for volunteers who respond to emergencies while on the job
CBC
A fire chief in Digby County, N.S., is calling for provincial legislation that would stop employers from reprimanding volunteer firefighters if they leave work to respond to an emergency.
Joshua Snyder, the chief of the Smiths Cove Volunteer Fire Department, said he's heard some volunteers are reluctant to respond while working, and some employers have even refused to let workers leave.
"We are facing more and more calls. We are needed," Snyder told CBC Radio's Information Morning Cape Breton on Tuesday.
"It would be a travesty if you have a call and no one responds because they cannot leave work and they feel like they're going to lose their job."
Snyder said there is desperate need for more volunteer firefighters across the province, and there have been times within his own department when only three people have responded to an active structure fire.
"It's stressing, it's panicking, because you just keep wondering where everybody is. Is the fact that someone is scared to leave work hindering the department's ability to be able to do its job?" he said.
"So it's frightening, it's alarming, and this is something that's happening all across the province."
Snyder is now calling on the provincial government to create new legislation that would prevent volunteer firefighters and search and rescue personnel from being reprimanded if they respond to an emergency while working.
"I'm not naive to the fact that a business still has to run, but when you need a volunteer to respond to a tragedy … you expect someone to show up," he said.
He said this kind of legislation would encourage more people to volunteer because employers would be legally bound to allow them to leave during emergencies.
Snyder launched a petition in the spring, which is starting to gain some traction. As of Tuesday afternoon, the petition on Change.org has more than 770 signatures.
Lloyd MacIntosh, chief of the volunteer fire department in North Sydney, said he would support the petition, but he does have some reservations.
"If a person was working by themselves in a corner store and an alarm came in — doesn't matter the seriousness of the alarm — if they left that job and locked the doors, that's a whole day's revenue for a store or a small business that they're not going to get," MacIntosh said.
"You know these things need to be taken into account."
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