(Toronto, Canada) - Irving Consumer Products Ltd. was fined $100,000 after pleading guilty to a workplace-safety offence involving a worker critically injured by falling pulp bales, according to an Ontario court bulletin published October 27.

The conviction occurred September 11, 2026, in Toronto’s Provincial Offences Court. The injury happened September 13, 2024, at the tissue manufacturer’s workplace at 1551 Weston Road. The court also imposed a 25 per cent victim fine surcharge.

The ministry said a temporary-agency worker was operating a wire-cutting machine when a lift-truck operator placed four stacked pulp bales on the table’s stand. The upper two bales tipped over and critically injured the worker.

Investigators found employees hired after 2019 had not been trained on a procedure limiting the table to two bales, and workers routinely placed as many as four there, the bulletin says.

The company was convicted of failing to ensure the bales were positioned so they would not tip over, as required by the Industrial Establishments Regulation under the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

Ontario said the company subsequently redesigned the work area and bought a new wire chopper. The bulletin does not describe the worker’s current condition.

Source: Ontario Ministry of Labour court bulletin, October 27.

Editorial illustration of pulp-handling equipment; not the actual workplace or incident.