Regulations for Alberta’s Bill 6 may be ready in a year

May 26, 2016

A group has been assembled to shape the legislation

By Diego Flammini
Assistant Editor, North American Content
Farms.com

Farmers in Alberta may need to wait at least a year before they have an idea of the details that make up the Enhanced Protection for Farm and Ranch Workers Act, also known as Bill 6.

A group made up of 78 (72 members plus 6 chairs) farmers, ranchers, researchers and experts from other industries will work with six working groups to help the provincial government come up with regulations that are understandable and unique to agriculture.

The first meetings are scheduled for mid-June Alberta’s Agriculture Minister Oneil Carlier said he would like regulations to be ready for next spring. He’s insisted there’s no hard deadline and getting the regulations right is imperative.

The public will have an opportunity to provide their feedback once the regulations have been drafted.

The law was passed in December 2015 and as of Jan. 1 required producers to have Workers’ Compensation Board coverage for paid employees.

Under the new law, Occupational Health and Safety officers are allowed onto agricultural properties if a serious injury or death occurs.

Video: Cleaning Sheep Barns & Setting Up Chutes

Indoor sheep farming in winter at pre-lambing time requires that, at Ewetopia Farms, we need to clean out the barns and manure in order to keep the sheep pens clean, dry and fresh for the pregnant ewes to stay healthy while indoors in confinement. In today’s vlog, we put fresh bedding into all of the barns and we remove manure from the first groups of ewes due to lamb so that they are all ready for lambs being born in the next few days. Also, in preparation for lambing, we moved one of the sorting chutes to the Coveralls with the replacement ewe lambs. This allows us to do sorting and vaccines more easily with them while the barnyard is snow covered and hard to move sheep safely around in. Additionally, it frees up space for the second groups of pregnant ewes where the chute was initially.