New Health and Safety Obligations: A Checklist for Employers

November 19, 2025

Bill 59, the Act to modernize the occupational health and safety regime (the "AMOHSR"), received assent on October 6, 2021. This legislation represents a major reform of the occupational health and safety regime, resulting in significant changes to the Act respecting occupational health and safety (the "AOHS") and the Act respecting industrial accidents and occupational diseases (the "AIAOD").

Among these changes was the implementation of an interim regime of prevention and participation mechanisms with regard to occupational health and safety, with the objective of identifying, preventing, and controlling risks in all workplaces. The provisions of the AMOHSR relating to this interim regime came into force on April 6, 2022. However, the AMOHSR provided that a regulation would be adopted no later than October 6, 2025, to establish a permanent regime for prevention and participation mechanisms. We invite you to listen to our podcasts published in April 2022 and check out our blog post published in 2022 on this topic.

The Regulation respecting prevention and participation mechanisms in an establishment (the "Regulation") finally came into force on October 1, 2025. The Regulation sets out the rules applicable to prevention and participation mechanisms in workplaces.

At first glance, the obligations under the Regulation may seem significant for employers. However, since the mechanisms established by the interim regime should already be in place in your organization, the Regulation should not bring about any major changes. In fact, the Regulation generally replicates the same mechanisms provided for in the interim regime, with a few variations.

The notable difference between the two regimes lies in the criteria used to determine which mechanisms to apply. The interim regime provided for the determination of applicable mechanisms on the basis of two components: the classification of the establishment into priority groups, depending on its activities, and the number of workers in the establishment. The permanent regime, on the other hand, is based solely on the number of workers in the establishment, regardless of the priority group.

It should be noted that employers have one year from October 1, 2025, to comply with and implement the obligations set out in the Regulation. That said, employers who were already required to develop a Prevention Program under the AOHS before October 1, 2025, must implement and apply the Action Plan without delay.

Summary of the Obligations

In order to identify the prevention and participation mechanisms applicable to each establishment, the employer must first determine the number of workers in its establishment. The obligations vary depending on the number of workers in the establishment, i.e., 19 workers or fewer, or 20 workers or more.

To help you better understand your obligations as an employer, we provide below a table that summarizes the applicable mechanisms based on the number of employees per establishment.

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