Can You Be Sued for Giving First Aid in BC?

A worker goes down on your site. Someone is already beside him. And for half a second, that person hesitates, because somewhere in the back of their mind sits the thought that stepping in might come back on them.

It is one of the most common questions we get asked when we run first aid training, and it is worth answering properly, because the answer in British Columbia is not quite the one most people expect.

What the law actually says

British Columbia has a Good Samaritan Act (RSBC 1996, c. 172). The operative part is short. A person who renders emergency medical services or aid to an ill, injured or unconscious person, at the immediate scene, "is not liable for damages for injury to or death of that person caused by the person's act or omission in rendering the medical services or aid unless that person is grossly negligent."

Gross negligence is a high bar. It is not the same as getting something wrong, or doing an imperfect job under pressure. It means a marked departure from the standard a reasonable person would meet.

So for the bystander who stops and helps, the law is broadly on their side. That is the message the Canadian Red Cross and others put out, and it is correct.

The part that catches employers out

Section 2 of the same Act sets out where the protection does not apply. It does not apply to a person who "is employed expressly for that purpose," or who "does so with a view to gain."

Read that again with your own worksite in mind. The person you designated as your first aid attendant, the one you paid to hold the certificate and be available, is employed expressly for that purpose. The Good Samaritan Act is not written for them. It is written for the passerby.

This surprises a lot of safety managers. The common assumption is that the Act throws a blanket over everyone on site. It does not. It covers the volunteer. Your attendant sits outside it by design.

What that does and does not mean

It does not mean your attendant is exposed and it is certainly not a reason for anyone to hesitate. Workplace injuries in BC run through the workers' compensation system rather than the civil courts in the ordinary course, and the specific legal position of any individual is a question for a lawyer, not for us. We train first aid attendants. We are not a law firm, and nothing here is legal advice.

What it does mean is this: the Good Samaritan Act is not where a workplace's protection comes from. A statute you cite afterwards is not a safety program. What protects an employer, and protects the attendant, is being able to show that the right person was trained to the right level for that site, working inside the scope they were trained for, on a workplace that had actually been assessed.

That is a documentation question, and it is entirely within your control.

What BC has required since November 1, 2024

The first aid rules changed. If your program has not been looked at since then, it is worth an hour of somebody's time.

• A two-part written assessment for each workplace. Under sections 3.16(2) and 3.16(3.1) and Schedule 3-A, you assess the number of workers, the hazard rating, and how quickly emergency responders can actually reach that site. A downtown office and a remote pipeline right-of-way do not land in the same place.
• The certification levels were renamed. Basic replaces Level 1, Intermediate replaces Level 2, Advanced replaces Level 3.
• Intermediate got shorter. It was five days. It is now two. If the length of the course was the reason you kept putting it off, that reason is gone.
• Annual first aid drills. Section 3.17(4) requires drills yearly, or whenever your first aid procedures change significantly.
• Some sites need a transportation endorsement. A separate one-day course, where the assessment says you need to be able to move an injured worker yourself.

The date to put in your calendar

Certificates issued under the old system stay valid until they expire, with a grace period running to November 1, 2027.

That sounds far away. It is not, if you have forty attendants across six sites on staggered expiry dates and you have not started mapping who runs out when. Employers who leave it until 2027 will be trying to book training at the same time as everyone else in the province.

The short version

If you stop and help a stranger at the side of the road in BC, the law is largely on your side unless you are grossly negligent. If you are the designated first aid attendant at a workplace, that particular Act was not written with you in mind, and your employer's answer to a bad day is a properly assessed site with properly trained people on it.

We deliver Basic and Intermediate first aid training at your workplace across the Lower Mainland and Fraser Valley, for groups of 5 or more. If you are not sure which level your assessment points to, call us and we will walk through it with you.