NATIONAL DAY OF MOURNING APRIL 28th

One Workers Death or Injury Is One To Many

Many workers die in the workplace or suffer from an occupational disease.  In fact 20 workers were killed on the job in 1998. It is estimated that more then six thousand workers suffer from a disease as a result of their occupation every year. 

To remember these workers on February 1, 1991 the federal government in the House of Commons passed bill C-223 that declared April 28 a Day of Mourning for workers that have died or been injured as a result of their job.
 

Don't Mourn My Death

By David Linderman, USWA Local 6868, Oakville, Ontario Canada  

Mourn for my life, it was unkind and unjust,
I was killed by my workplace, after years of my trust.
I stood and I watched as the poisons rolled in,
Unaware of the evil that attacked from within.

It came and hit me, my defences were down,
There wasn’t a warning, no movement, no sound.
My body was strong, my hands filled with power,
So I worked unprotected, every minute, every hour.
I am a strong man who was brought to his knees,
By the cold cruel hunger of a silent disease.
If I knew that to work was like going to war,
I would have dug in and fought a long time before.

All my life I’ve been ready and willing to fight;
Now I lay in the deepest and darkest of night.
Kept awake by the sound of my own shallow breath,
And I wait and I long for a merciful death.
For one must listen, you must understand,
Keep death at a distance, and fear close at hand.
Please heed this advice, it’s all that I’m giving,
I’m too weak to rise up and fight for the living.

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