Who Alberta and Ontario Are Inspecting This Year, and What to Do if Your Province Publishes Nothing

Alberta and Ontario both named the sectors they will proactively inspect this fiscal year. British Columbia runs a different kind of list, and three provinces publish nothing at all. Here is what each one actually says, and what to have ready either way.

Most employers never see an inspection priorities list until an officer is already on site. That is a missed opportunity, because several provinces publish exactly where they intend to look before the year starts. Two of them, Alberta and Ontario, have named specific sectors for the fiscal year running from 1 April 2026 to 31 March 2027. This is what each list actually says, what the other provinces do instead, and what to have ready regardless of which one applies to you.

Alberta: named sectors, plus two standing programs

Alberta OHS's proactive inspection program for 2026-27 names four groups of employers for targeted attention: manufacturing (steel and metal, welding, wood products, furniture, transit mix), oil and gas (upstream, well servicing, drilling, pipeline construction), mobile community services (towing, ambulance, fire, contract waste collection), and liquor and convenience stores. Ongoing focused initiatives continue alongside these in construction, restaurants, hotels, day care, automotive repair, machining, nail salons and arenas.

Two further programs run underneath the sector list and apply regardless of industry. The Major Projects Program covers any project over five million dollars. The Chronic Noncompliance Program targets employers with a documented pattern of repeat violations, and a Reinspection Program follows up on prior orders within six to eighteen months.

Ontario: a parallel list, different sectors

Ontario's Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development runs an equivalent program for the same fiscal year, naming residential construction, health care (with a focus on the internal responsibility system), industrial sectors including retail, farming and education, mining (specifically energy isolation and lockout practices), occupational hygiene (noise), ergonomics in retail, and radiation protection in veterinary clinics. The overlap with Alberta's list is limited, which is the point: each regulator sets priorities from its own injury and complaint data, not a shared national list.

British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and New Brunswick

WorkSafeBC runs planned inspectional initiatives on a rolling, multi-year basis rather than a single fiscal-year list, so there is no 2026-27 document to check against. Saskatchewan, Manitoba and New Brunswick do not publish a sector-targeted inspection list at all. That is not the same as saying nothing is being inspected. It means the planning has to come from your own numbers instead of a public document: your injury and near-miss history, the sectors your own insurer flags, and what came up in your last inspection or audit.

What actually gets asked for, on any list or none

Whichever province you operate in, the documents an officer reaches for first do not change much. In order:

• The written hazard assessment for the specific task underway, not a general site assessment
• Training records for the workers doing that task, including whether certifications are current
• The most recent site or equipment inspection records
• Evidence that a previously identified hazard was actually corrected, not just logged

A program that exists on paper but has not been reviewed against current work is the most common gap. New equipment, a new site, a new subcontractor, or a province your company did not used to work in are all reasons a written program can fall out of step with the job in front of an officer.

Where this connects to your COR or SECOR cycle

For employers holding a Certificate of Recognition, the calendar adds a second, unrelated deadline worth planning around at the same time. An Alberta COR is valid three years from issue, with a maintenance audit required in each of the two years between certification audits, and data gathering for that audit generally needs to be complete before 31 December. Certifying Partner deadlines for booking an auditor or registering an action plan typically fall six to eight weeks earlier than that, which makes September and October the practical window to book, not November.