WSIB Workers Say AI Push Preceded Their Layoffs

As Ontario's Workplace Safety and Insurance Board lays off hundreds of employees, some workers who received layoff notices, along with their union, are directly connecting the cuts to the agency's rollout of artificial intelligence tools, according to CBC News's reporting on the layoffs.

The Ontario Compensation Employees Union, which represents WSIB workers, says 566 people were affected by the layoffs, including both unionized and non-unionized employees, according to OCEU president Harry Goslin. Brittnee Gauthier, a post-adjustment case manager in Sudbury, was one of them. She described the sequence of events directly to CBC News: before the layoffs, WSIB made "a huge push" internally to implement a new AI claim summary tool designed to review and summarize documents. "We all were excited about this tool that was getting launched, until we found out it was making us all redundant," Gauthier said. "I can only deduce that the future will be AI for this company."

The layoffs carry real, immediate consequences for affected families. Sanjeev Kapoor, a WSIB customer service representative in Sudbury who was included in the layoffs, described the moment his young son learned the news. His wife, Alyson Love-Kapoor, said the first thing their son asked was: "Are we going to lose our house?" "You can't [answer questions like that]," Kapoor said. "He doesn't want us to talk about it, because he gets upset." Kapoor separately told CBC that WSIB has been "pushing [AI] down people's throats" on the job.

WSIB's Provincial Job Cuts by Region

WSIB's own public explanation for the cuts centers on operational restructuring rather than AI displacement directly. According to an internal email obtained by Sudbury.com, WSIB president and CEO Jeffery Lang told staff the office closures reflected a shift from a "storefront" retail service model toward online service delivery, with claims, account management, and back-end support consolidating into eight primary offices across the province: London, Mississauga, North York, Scarborough, Toronto, Hamilton, Ottawa, and Waterloo. Goslin, however, told Sudbury.com the union believes the real driver isn't the retail model explanation at all, but rather a response to provincial cost pressure, a distinction connected to the broader pattern we've tracked closely in Deutsche Bank's own warning about "AI redundancy washing," companies attributing layoffs to AI when the real driver is broader cost-cutting.

This case is worth understanding for any business currently rolling out AI tools to employees while simultaneously planning workforce reductions, since the sequencing here, introducing an AI tool with visible internal enthusiasm, then laying off the workers who used it, is exactly the pattern that erodes employee trust fastest and most durably. Once workers connect a new AI tool directly to their own job loss, that association tends to poison receptiveness to future AI adoption efforts, even well-intentioned ones.

For businesses managing genuine restructuring alongside AI tool rollouts, this case underscores the importance of transparent, consistent communication about the actual relationship between the two. Ambiguity or conflicting explanations, as WSIB workers describe experiencing here, tends to generate exactly the kind of distrust and public scrutiny this story reflects.

How many WSIB workers were laid off?
The Ontario Compensation Employees Union says 566 people, including both unionized and non-unionized employees, were affected by WSIB's layoffs, with cuts concentrated across nine Ontario communities including Sudbury, Windsor, and Waterloo.

What AI tool do WSIB workers say was linked to the layoffs?
Workers described a new AI claim summary tool, introduced with significant internal promotion, designed to review and summarize documents, which affected employees say was directly connected to the job cuts that followed.

What reason did WSIB officially give for the layoffs?
WSIB's CEO told staff the changes reflected a shift from in-person "storefront" service delivery toward online service, consolidating operations into eight primary offices across the province, a framing the workers' union disputes as the real underlying reason.

Laid-off Workplace Safety and Insurance Board employees and their union say a new AI claim summary tool was introduced with visible internal enthusiasm shortly before the agency cut 566 jobs across Ontario, with workers describing the sequence as directly connected. WSIB's official explanation cites a shift from in-person to online service delivery, but the union representing affected employees disputes that framing, pointing instead to broader provincial cost-cutting pressure. The layoffs carry genuine human consequences for affected families, with one worker's young son reportedly asking whether the family would lose their home after learning of the job loss.