Retirees at GE plant in Peterborough, Ont. see hope for health claims
PETERBOROUGH, Ont. — Marilyn Harding cries as she talks about her late husband and his death from pancreatic cancer five years after retiring from a three-decade career at the General Electric factory in her hometown.
Harding, who spent nearly 40 years working at the plant until she retired in 2004, has also had cancer, as have many of her former colleagues.
“Once we got out of there and retired, everyone started to get sick,” she said.
For more than a decade, several hundred retirees from the hulking Peterborough plant, which produced engines for trains and ships among other things, have claimed illnesses linked to exposure to toxins inside the factory. Now, they may soon get the compensation they have sought from the provincial government.