Hamilton Spectator
8/15/2012
Staff at the Barton Street Jail are reportedly being told to ignore an order by the Ministry of Labour to lift a lockdown that has been in place since Monday.
Prisoners have been confined to their cells since then over a health and safety dispute between management and corrections officers.
The Ministry of Labour was called today and determined that the action is not justified under labour laws.
But the chair of the corrections division of OPSEU says workers will stop the job action only if they're allowed to complete a jail search wearing a protective safety vest.
The dispute began after staff discovered a piece of metal from a fixture was missing. The facility was searched but the situation became inflamed when staff requesed to wear protective vests to continue with the search.
The vest is apparently only authorized in specific situations.
Inmates who called the media to report the lockdown say they haven’t had clean clothes or sheets for a week.
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