The goal of Transport Canada’s recent consultation on safety management systems (SMS) in the rail industry was to get feedback from the public and stakeholders on the strengths and weaknesses of the current system. We held the 30-day consultation between August 24 and September 26, 2022.
We wrote a discussion paper and asked five questions to gather feedback and encourage discussion:
- What are the most effective elements of the current regulations? What areas should be improved or are lacking?
- Is the current scope adequate? Does it reflect the differences between the various type of operations?
- Should the railway SMS regulations include additional management-based requirements (possibly as additional processes)? If so, which ones?
- Is the current approach to determine under which circumstances a company must conduct a risk assessment adequate?
- Should there be additional requirements surrounding effectiveness?
We received one response through the Let’s Talk Transportation website and nine submissions from stakeholders.
Summary of stakeholder comments
Through the 10 submissions received, stakeholders shared their views on various parts of the regulations. Overall, they agreed that safety management systems are vital for a company to maintain a high level of safety and constantly improve.
Stakeholders also recognized that a lot of work has been done since 2001, and that it’s important to take stock of where we are. The themes below were discussed in more detail in their submissions.
Scope of the regulations
Through the 10 submissions received, stakeholders shared their views on various parts of the regulations. Overall, they agreed that safety management systems are vital for a company to maintain a high level of safety and constantly improve.
Stakeholders also recognized that a lot of work has been done since 2001, and that it’s important to take stock of where we are. The themes below were discussed in more detail in their submissions.
Scope of the regulations
Comments show that the regulations are well-scoped and strike the right balance of requirements for large and small railway companies. They set clear expectations for companies to:
- ensure safe operations;
- document their SMS;
- report hazards; and
- make sure an executive is accountable.
However, participants noted that there were instances where we could improve how the regulations address some of the differences for some types of operations, for example:
- in cases where a company with limited operations meet the same applicability criteria than a large Class I company;
- instances where local railway companies have very limited operations on a main track; or
- when a parent company maintains specific safety management systems for several companies it owns.
Participants highlighted that the processes for accountability and index help keep railway companies up-to-date on their obligations and on the rules and regulations in force.
Risk assessments
Although there was general agreement that risk assessments are a key part of the safety management system process, opinions differed as to what needs to be looked at more in depth.
The highlights are:
- Some stakeholders advised that TC should develop and put in place a national risk assessment process that provides a strategic overview of risks to rail safety, reflecting national data trends that are more difficult to see by a railway.
- Other stakeholders felt that the current approach is sufficient. They highlighted that there are many standards and best practices available for companies to define and implement risk assessment processes.
- Other areas that some participants would like to see improved are:
- more frequent risk assessments and for a broader range of changes that affect safety, including minor changes;
- employees affected by the risks should not only be consulted, but be required to participate in the risk assessment;
- broader requirements for remedial measures, and defined timelines for when they should be implemented and evaluated;
- a periodic review of the risk assessment process.
Effectiveness and safety culture
Effectiveness was a recurring theme among stakeholders. There was a general consensus that it is difficult to measure, and that there must be a clear understanding of what will be measured and how. Many stakeholders were willing to work together to set clear and consistent base level expectations for measuring effectiveness.
The following points were also raised:
- Complying with safety management system requirements administratively may not be an optimal way to monitor or measure a company’s safety performance or safety culture.
- The way we measure a safety culture should be flexible so that it can be revised as part of a system’s continuous improvement process.
- Companies should be required to have up-to-date action plans that ensure their safety management system is effective.
- Measuring the effectiveness of the overall safety oversight regime is very important. We should use a risk-based approach, with risk management tools and practices that quantify and measure how effective an organization is at managing safety and reducing risks. This could also be shown by comparing a company’s safety performance with key performance indicators.
Prescriptive requirements and clarity
The idea of prescriptive versus performance-based requirements was raised, along with the issue of clarity.
- Some stakeholders felt that safety management system requirements should not be overly prescriptive. Instead, they should outline the requirements that need to be met while being flexible enough for the railways to determine how they will address the requirements. They should allow companies to tailor their safety management system based on the size and scope of their operations.
- Some terms or concepts, like “safety concerns” should be clarified to make sure regulated parties understand the expectations.
Oversight and enforcement
Some companies felt that safety management systems need to be audited and enforced in a consistent way across the country. They felt that this would assist companies to align with Transport Canada’s expectations. To that end, a national audit program would be preferred to a decentralized system.
Some stakeholders wanted greater consequences for companies when they do not follow the regulations and when a safety management system is not effective.
Finally, it was raised that the combination of Transport Canada audits and the requirements of the Process for Continual Improvement of the Safety Management System do not allow sufficient time for companies to implement and evaluate corrective action before a new audit is initiated.
Other processes
The consultation included the option of adding processes to the regulations that related to a broader range of situations.
- While they agreed these were important issues, stakeholders did not feel that adding management-based requirements like bridge safety and adapting to climate change is required. They noted any hazards and risk management related to these, from an operational perspective, are already within the scope of a safety management system.
- Participants raised that other jurisdictions have other requirements that we could explore. For example, Australia has requirements for maintaining a safety culture. It uses safety performance measures to determine effectiveness, emergency management, and consulting with external stakeholders. The United Kingdom provides a Railway Management Maturity Model to help companies evaluate the effectiveness of their safety management systems.
Other areas to consider
- We must avoid unnecessary overlap with other legislative requirements, like those already present in the Canada Labour Code.
- Improvements to how we identify hazards and reduce the impact of risks, as well as manage safety risks.
- Safety management systems should be direct, concise, effective, and remove as many redundancies as possible.
- A revised regulation should consider both human and organizational factors, such as:
- the interactions between systems and humans;
- behavior;
- workload; and
- mental fatigue.
- There is a broad range of subjects that should be analysed further. This analysis should include elements like:
- distractions in the workplace;
- near-misses; and
- inaccurately classified safety concerns or hazards.
- There should be more requirements and responsibility for rail companies to work together and share safety management system information with municipalities. This would help make sure that municipalities are aware of the risks of goods moving within their boundaries and know how to plan for derailments, specifically those involving dangerous goods.
Next steps
We reviewed the comments from this consultation and will take them into consideration as we review our oversight approach, our guidance for industry, and develop a proposal for an updated regulation.
As our work proceeds, we will continue to engage with stakeholders on specific topics.
The next round of broad consultations will take place once an updated regulatory proposal is developed.