Toronto mental health centre faces 9 charges for not protecting workers

Toronto's Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, whose staff members have complained they are at the mercy of violent patients, has been charged with violating the Occupational Health and Safety Act, the CBC has learned.

The nine charges laid against the centre by the Ontario Ministry of Labour include failing to develop and maintain violence-prevention procedures and failing to protect workers.

If CAMH is convicted, the penalties could include fines of up to $500,000 per offence.

The charges stem from a single incident in November 2007, details of which have not been disclosed. But much has been said about working conditions behind the walls of CAMH facilities, particularly the large institution once known as the Queen Street Mental Health Centre.

Staff members at that facility have called it an unacceptably dangerous place to work. There have been reports of nurses being spat on and punched, bones being broken and a sexual assault.

There are allegations that security staff lacked keys to a secure treatment area inside the centre in the event a nurse was being attacked.

For more than a year, the Ontario Nurses' Association has asked for panic buttons for nurses and better security on every floor.

The Ontario Public Service Employees Union, which represents non-nursing staff, posted bus shelter ads near the centre earlier this month showing a woman with a bruised eye and reading: "No more excuses. The Centre for Addiction and Mental Health must protect its staff from violence. It's the law."

The ads were taken down amid charges that they stigmatized mental patients.

Danielle Larmand, president of  the nurses' union local representing nurses at the Queen St. facility, said she is pleased the province is doing something to address the problem.

"We will never be able to eliminate all violence," she told CBC News. "It's not because we specifically work with mental health and addictions; it's the nature of the business. But we can certainly minimize the violence and ensure that every precaution is in place."

She said CAMH has been ordered to do a floor-by-floor safety audit and will consider issuing personal safety alarms to those who need them.

CAMH's vice-president of human resources, Eric Preston, promised improvements but said safety has not been ignored.

"I think we have workplace safety as a top-of-mind issue. As I said before, we're equally concerned with patient safety.

"We have a lot of processes and training in place to make things as safe as possible. Can we do better? Certainly. Can we do more? Definitely. Will we be doing more? Absolutely."

CAMH was created when the Queen St. operation merged in 1998 with the Addiction Research Foundation, the Donwood Institute and the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry.