New law reforms Ontario's loosely regulated security industry
Makes licensing and training mandatory
Last Updated: Thursday, August 23, 2007 | 12:46 PM ET
CBC News
New rules that make training and licensing mandatory for all workers in Ontario's security industry went into effect on Thursday.
Bill 159, covering everyone from bouncers at nightclubs to mall security guards and private investigators, strengthens professional requirements for the industry.
Patrick Shand, 31, died in September 1999 after he was handcuffed and pinned to the ground outside a Scarborough Loblaws store by two staffers and a private security guard.
(File photo)
The bill was passed following a coroner's inquest into the death of a man accused of shoplifting at a grocery store in Toronto's Agincourt Mall in 1999.
Patrick Shand, 31, died after two store employees and a private security guard held him on the ground, face down, the coroner's jury was told.
Paul Rivenbark, president of security company G4S Canada, said the extra training required under the new bill may have prevented Shand's death.
"They had received zero training on any types of security, or first aid or CPR," Rivenbark said of the workers involved in the incident.
"If they would have, they would have become aware of the hazards of holding someone face down, handcuffing them and not making sure that they're breathing."
Julian Falconer, a lawyer who represented the Shand family through the inquest, said that for them, Bill 159 is seen as a way to prevent the kind of scenario that led to their son's death.
"Often, coroner's inquests are criticized as creating recommendations that go nowhere," Falconer said. "Clearly, this is an example of a family that saw it from beginning to end, and it has gone somewhere."
The bill, revising the Private Investigators and Security Guards Act, marks the first change to Ontario's law on the security industry in more than 41 years.
Since the act came into force in 1966, the industry has expanded rapidly, with some 66,000 private security guards now working throughout the province.
All companies affected by the new guidelines will have up to two years to comply with them.
