The Union of Safety and Justice Employees has submitted its 2026 federal pre-budget brief calling on the Government of Canada to immediately improve access to Workers’ Compensation on behalf of federal Public Safety Personnel represented by USJE.
USJE has gathered robust evidence-based legislative and legal advice in order to propose substantial amendments to the federal Government Employees Compensation Act, a piece of legislation that has not fundamentally changed in over 50 years.
The key changes proposed by USJE embed a definition of Public Safety Personnel into federal legislation to ensure that federal public service employees working in the public safety, national security and/or criminal justice systems have access to presumptive injury coverage when they incur a work-related Occupational Stress Injury and seek Workers’ Compensation coverage.
Over time, these legislative changes will increase the likelihood that far more federal employees who suffer from a work-related mental health injury will benefit from early intervention by qualifying for Workers’ Compensation with the goal of, ultimately, returning to work.
At its core, changes to the Government Employees Compensation Act (GECA) will reduce the likelihood that federal public safety personnel will:
- Suffer in silence while on the job, potentially comprising their performance and longevity;
- Resort to sick leave or long-term disability as the only options for recovery; and/or
- Choose to leave the public service altogether owing to an untreated mental health injury, taking with them the expertise and the experience developed over years/decades as a federal public safety employee.
The immediate benefit of changes to GECA is that federal public safety personnel working within the public safety realm, no matter where they live in Canada, will have improved access to presumptive injury coverage, specifically Workers’ Compensation Insurance Benefits and the mental health supports that are embedded within to increase their chances of successfully returning to work.
Unfortunately, provincial and territorial Workers’ Compensation programs – which are mandated to address workplace Injuries on the part of federal public service employees – have largely confined the recognition of the risk of psychological injury to traditional ‘first responders’ (ie. police, fire, paramedics, and Correctional guards).
Given these narrow terms, many USJE members, no matter where they live in Canada, who have direct or indirect exposure to traumatic materials and/or events are not covered by current presumptive injury clauses.
For every day that the federal government declines to implement these targeted federal legislative reforms, many federal Public Safety Personnel will continue to be denied timely access to treatment which will only exacerbate their mental health injuries and force many to prematurely leave the public safety realm, forfeiting years – if not decades – of expertise and experience as they endeavour to keep Canadians safe.
We urge the Government of Canada to implement the proposed amendments to the Government Employees Compensation Act immediately.