Status of Women Committee on May 14th, 2009

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Order. Good morning, everyone.

I would like to thank the witnesses very much for coming this morning. As you know, we're speaking to the study of the Public Sector Equitable Compensation Act. We have put together about four weeks in which to look at this issue.

Usually when witnesses come—I want to thank you for coming on what I know was relatively short notice—they have ten minutes to present. There are three groups here.

Those of you from the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union can decide among yourselves how you will do your ten minutes. Then we have the Canadian Labour Congress for ten minutes, followed by Marie-Thérèse Chicha, here as an individual, for ten minutes.

That will be 30 minutes, and after that there will be questioning from the members. That goes in a particular order. I would like to remind you and also remind the members that the timeline for questioning includes the time for the answers.

Thank you very much. I shall begin with Ms. Pageau.

[Gisèle Pageau, Human Rights Director, Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada]

Thank you.

The Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada appreciates the opportunity to address the standing committee on this issue.

The CEP is one of Canada's largest sector unions, representing 130,000 workers in a wide range of occupations across Canada, including occupations in both the private and broader public sectors, such as media workers, workers in the chemical and energy sectors, pulp and paper workers, and telecommunication workers.

The CEP has a long-standing record of defending the human rights of its members and has an especially strong interest in pay equity matters. We are the first union to undertake joint union-management pay equity initiatives in several of Canada's private and publicly owned telephone companies, one of which took 15 years to conclude.

The CEP is grateful for this opportunity to present some comments to the standing committee, with the goal of achieving an equitable wage structure for both men and women in Canadian workplaces, and to explain to you just how inequitable and discriminatory the current act is and how it does absolutely nothing to achieve pay equity.

Sex and gender-based pay inequity is a human rights issue. It is the result of systemic discrimination and societal perception of the value of work traditionally performed by women. Consequently, to consider pay equity a labour issue to be dealt with at the bargaining table is not only detrimental; it's also an inaccurate characterization of the nature of pay inequity. Pay equity must remain a human rights issue and must not form part of a collective bargaining scheme.

There are number of reasons why characterization of pay equity as simply an aspect of labour or employment law should be avoided. First, to characterize it as such undermines Canada's international commitment to human rights, including equal pay for work of equal value. In a labour context, human rights are paramount, and parties cannot legally contract out of human rights obligations. Forcing pay equity into collective bargaining processes and out of the process of human rights risks the erosion, or bargaining away, of whatever pay equity gains have been made by women. The rights of disadvantaged groups and minorities should never be subject to the whims of the majority.

Secondly, the inclusion of pay equity as an issue to be negotiated through collective bargaining ignores the systemic and encompassing nature of pay inequity. The systemic discrimination is reflected not just in the organization of workplaces, but also in the structure and the strength of bargaining units and unions. Bargaining units that are predominantly female may invite the replication of patterns and perceptions, or gender segregation, and the undervaluing of work. This lends itself to an inherent, though sometimes unconscious, power imbalance at the bargaining table, thereby undermining the principles that pay equity attempts to promote.

The CEP advocates a comprehensive and collaborative model of pay equity legislations for all workplaces, whether private or public. While the CEP believes that individuals should have a mechanism available to them whereby complaints can be initiated, the CEP acknowledges that a complaint-based system alone cannot ensure compliance with pay equity. Instead, the CEP envisions a more proactive pay equity scheme. This would include a positive duty on employers to review organizational wage structures and to remedy gender-biased pay practices.

The CEP also believes, however, an audit system would help to ensure adherence to a more proactive approach to pay equity. Audits must be conducted thoroughly and consistently to ensure a seamless continuity of pay equity throughout the federal sphere. In addition, employers must provide realistic and tangible timelines for the implementation of equitable wage structures and payouts for past discriminatory practices.

It is the view of the CEP that pay equity is not a one-time remedy, but rather that it must be examined frequently in the workplace. This is to ensure that employers are complying with pay equity regardless of the economic and social climate, which may serve to inadvertently, yet adversely, affect ongoing pay equity initiatives.

The idea is that concepts of pay equity are not stagnant, and fluctuate with ever-changing notions of equality and emerging trends in the workplaces.

The CEP advocates for greater participation of unions to ensure that the goal of pay equity is attained in the workplace. It should be noted that increased union participation cannot be equated with the union's responsibility for a compensation perspective. The employers pay wages, and are solely responsible for non-discriminatory compensation practices. The inherent power imbalance within the employer-union relationship, and the fact that ultimately employers hold the purse strings, precludes unions from liability for pay equity. This is consistent with union advocacy for equitable wage structures. Furthermore, the thrust with the current legislation, which holds employers solely responsible for discriminatory wage differences, should not be altered.

Finally, our own CEP telephone operators lived through 15 years of game-playing by their employers as a result of inadequate legislation. The CEP fought long and hard to bring pay equity to 4,700 telephone operators, of whom about 18% died before ever seeing a dime.

We all know what needs to be done. As you are all aware, the pay equity task force has exhaustively studied this issue. Several years ago, almost 200 people gave oral presentations. There were 60 written submissions from groups across the country. There were five round tables with multi-stakeholder groups, and the task force looked at proactive pay equity legislation in a number of jurisdictions in Canada to identify best practices. This government does not need to reinvent the wheel on this issue.

Instead of implementing this appalling and regressive act, I call on the Government of Canada to step up to the plate and do what is right and long overdue for the women of Canada, and that is to simply implement the recommendations of the pay equity task force.

Merci.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you. Very efficient; you have three minutes left. That's great. We'll save them. Barbara will probably want to take 13....

No, I'm just kidding, Barbara. Go ahead.

[Barbara Byers, Executive Vice-President, Canadian Labour Congress]

Okay. Thank you.

The Canadian Labour Congress is pleased to make a presentation to this Standing Committee on the Status of Women concerning the government's Public Sector Equitable Compensation Act.

We are very concerned about the implications of this legislation for workers in the public sector and indeed for the future of pay equity in Canada. The CLC has been involved with the pay equity issue for many years. We were full participants in the consultations conducted by the pay equity task force that led to the very thorough recommendations presented in May 2004. As this committee is fully aware, the task force presented a series of measures that would have transformed the federal pay equity regime and made it more effective and fair for women working in the federal sector. This committee made a number of recommendations, very important recommendations, in your 2005 report, Moving Forward on the Pay Equity Task Force Recommendations.

It is unfortunate in the extreme that the government has chosen to ignore the recommendations of both the pay equity task force and the Standing Committee on the Status of Women.

The government claims that “the current pay equity system in the federal public service is broken”. We agree, but we would argue that the federal pay equity law needs to be fixed by adopting pay equity legislation on the Ontario or Quebec models. The equitable compensation act is nothing like the other pay equity laws in this country. Making pay equity a matter for collective bargaining will not work, and in fact Gisèle, I think, has pointed that out very clearly.

In fact, our unions support effective proactive pay equity legislation because for years we've been unable to bargain pay equity in collective agreements. Only two years ago, library workers in several cities in British Columbia went on strike over pay equity issues. B.C. is one of the only remaining Canadian jurisdictions that does not have legislation in place to enforce pay equity, and yet the federal Conservatives want to throw us back into this kind of regime with essentially no proactive pay equity law.

The government argues that women face lengthy delays in getting pay equity settlements because of divisive court proceedings. Delays certainly have been a major concern, but in general women have been forced to wait years under the current system because employers fight against pay equity plans and take the unions, who represent their members' pay equity claims, to court. The federal pay equity settlement was delayed for years as the federal government fought the Public Service Alliance of Canada through the courts in an attempt to avoid providing pay equity to federal workers. The union finally won in court.

In addition, many of the longest battles for pay equity through legal proceedings have involved private sector workers and their unions facing employers who drag them through the courts to stop pay equity. For example, you've heard from Gisèle about Bell Canada and the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union's 15-year battle. Air Canada and the Canadian Union of Public Employees, 17 years; Canada Post and the Public Service Alliance of Canada, 25 years. But the equitable compensation act only applies to federal government employees. Federally regulated private sector employees, where all these delays occurred, will continue under the old pay equity regime.

Now, how does this exactly make sense?

The government proposes its legislation as proactive pay equity, but simply calling something proactive does not make it so. Proactive pay equity legislation requires employers to examine their compensation systems to ensure that they are paying equal pay for work of equal value. In proactive pay equity legislation, individual complaints are not the trigger to challenge pay and equity. Rather, the approach is systemic.

Let me explain that a little bit further. Proactive laws place the responsibility for eliminating discriminatory wages on employers. Proactive laws ensure union involvement in negotiating pay equity in processes separate from regular collective bargaining. Proactive laws require comparison on the basis of skills, effort, and responsibilities required, and the working conditions under which the work is conducted. Proactive laws do not introduce market forces as a factor for consideration, as does the Conservatives' act. Proactive laws require employers to set aside separate funds—usually about 1% of payroll per year—for pay equity settlements.

Proactive laws establish an expert pay equity body, which is responsible for assisting parties and resolving disputes. None—none—of these features are in the equitable compensation act.

Conservative MPs have repeatedly told us that their legislation “addresses the key recommendations of the 2004 report by setting out a proactive and collaborative system”. That's taken from the Ottawa Citizen of March 7 of this year.

In fact, what the equitable compensation act mandates is the complete opposite of what the task force recommended.

It's important to know what the recommendations really are. One of those recommendations is as follows:

Though there are arguments in favour of placing pay equity legislation in the category of either labour legislation or human rights legislation, we have concluded that it should be characterized as human rights legislation....The problem of wage discrimination arises, however, because they are women, not because they are workers. We believe that characterizing a pay equity statute as human rights legislation reflects this fact.

That's from page 150 of the pay equity task force's final report from 2004.

The equitable compensation act makes pay equity a labour law. The review body is the Public Service Labour Relations Board, a labour law body with no expertise in pay equity. For these reasons among others, the CLC--along with pay equity and equality advocates across the country--is very concerned, and we view the Conservatives' legislation as actually an attack on pay equity and on women's human right to work without wage discrimination.

We've distributed copies of Pay Inequity: Canadian Labour Congress Analysis of the Public Sector Equitable Compensation Act for your review. The analysis includes a critique of the requirements in the act to refer to market conditions when doing equitable compensation review, as well as a more in-depth analysis of our concerns about the role of and the penalties against unions for defending their members' rights for equality. We've also distributed the presentation we made to the finance committee in February of this year on the inequitable compensation act.

We urge this committee to continue to press the government for real, proactive pay equity legislation based squarely on the recommendations of the pay equity task force report.

Thank you. Merci beaucoup.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much, Barbara.

Gosh, there are two minutes to spare.

[Barbara Byers]

We think there's been enough talk. We need some action.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Ms. Chicha.

[Marie-Thérèse Chicha, Professor, School of Industrial Relations, University of Montreal, As an Individual]

I would like to begin by thanking the Committee for inviting me to share my thoughts on the Public Sector Equitable Compensation Act.

My name is Marie-Thérèse Chicha, and I am a professor at the School of Industrial Relations at the University of Montreal. I chaired the Committee which prepared the draft bill which eventually led to the Pay Equity Act in Quebec. I also had the honour of being a member of the Federal Task Force which produced the report entitled: “Pay Equity: A New Approach to a Fundamental Right”. I am appearing before the Committee today as an individual, and thus I am not representing the University of Montreal. I am also an expert on equality issues, and specifically, pay equity, for the International Labour Organization in Geneva.

My objective this morning is to review some of the salient aspects of the Public Sector Equitable Compensation Act, in relation to wage discrimination issue and the intended objective.

Gender-based wage discrimination refers to the practice of not giving equal pay for work of equal value based on gender. That principle is enshrined in Convention No. 100 of the International Labour Organization, which was adopted in 1950. Therefore, this principle has been recognized internationally for some 59 years now. This is not a new issue, and one might expect, since the problem has been around for 59 years — and perhaps even longer — that it would have been resolved by now.

However, what we are seeing is that there still exists a significant wage gap between men and women at this time. The 2006 census showed that the wage gap between men and women ranged from 72 per cent to 85 per cent, depending on age, and that this percentage is changing very slowly.

So, that is a very surprising result, given the enormous progress made by women in terms of their educational level and uninterrupted attachment to the labour market, factors which tended to penalize them previously but should no longer be in play.

So, why does there continue to be a wage gap? It is certainly due, in large part, to wage discrimination between so-called female-dominated and male-dominated jobs.

I think it would be useful to provide a quick overview of the causes of wage discrimination, in order to have a clear understanding of the need for well articulated, very specific legislation that directly addresses the problem.

The main cause of this gap is the invisibility of women's work. Assessment methods and compensation systems underestimate the different features of female jobs. For example, there is a belief that women's work involves no physical effort, no risk and no danger. As a result, in terms of assessing and setting compensation for women, such factors are not considered.

It is also believed that the underlying requirements of female jobs, such as caring for children, empathy and good interpersonal skills are innate factors. As a result, they are not considered for the purposes of compensation.

All of these different factors mean that female jobs are undervalued and, by that very fact, undercompensated. They are undervalued because the evaluation methods used in the corporate world are methods that were designed primarily for male-dominated jobs. They involve upward responsibility or working with very sophisticated or heavy equipment, such as trucks, dollies, and so on. These evaluation methods do not consider the special characteristics of female-type jobs.

Obviously, if the evaluation methods on which compensation systems are based are inherently biased--

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Excuse me, Madame Chicha. We will resume your report when we resolve the distraction at the back of the room.

Thank you.

Please resume.

[Marie-Thérèse Chicha]

I will summarize what I just said. The visibility of the specific characteristics of female work has an effect on the evaluation methods used by employers. These evaluation methods, on which compensation systems are based, will therefore result in wages which are discriminatory and which are lower. Pay equity was designed to resolve that specific problem.

What is the best model for achieving pay equity? A number of models have been tried. At the international level, Canada is considered to be a laboratory for the various pay equity models that exist. We started out with a complaint-based model, which is the current model and which was, in any case, the model used to develop the Canadian Human Rights Act.

As my colleagues have just pointed out, that model has been a source of dispute. When complaints were filed, settlements would only be achieved some 15 or 20 years later. Many people never saw any money at all, because they had already died by the time the case was settled in court. In fact, it was an ineffective model which ultimately did not do people justice. It was also extremely costly. You may recall that the court case involving the Public Service Alliance of Canada cost between $3 and $4 billion, including the back pay that was owed.

In light of the enormous costs of the complaint-based model, a number of jurisdictions have adopted what is known as the proactive model. Manitoba was the first to do so, followed by Ontario, which also extended it to the private sector, whereas in Manitoba, it covered the public and parapublic sectors. Quebec then did the same, and also extended it to the private sector. Quebec used the Ontario model and improved it using--

Let us just say that it is a proactive model. The federal task force that I sat on considered that model to be the most effective for achieving pay equity. I will start by describing its main components and then compare it to what is proposed under the current act.

Here are the main points. In a proactive model, pay equity is an obligation for all employers and it is their responsibility to enforce pay equity in the workplace. That is the first feature. Unlike the reactive model, which is complaint-based, the proactive model does not wait until a complaint has been filed to ensure that pay equity is achieved.

The second feature has to do with a specific timeline. When a complaint is lodged, we do not want to wait 20, 25 or 30 years for pay equity to become a reality. As recommended by the Task Force, a proactive model provides for a three-year timeframe for the work to be completed—in order to determine what wage gaps exist, for example—and three years to then pay compensation to the individuals who have been discriminated against.

The third feature is that the Task Force laid out a step-by-step program. That program included determining the predominance of different jobs—in other words, which male and female jobs should be compared and what the best method of evaluating them would be. The evaluation method must always include four factors, as we just saw: qualifications, responsibilities, the conditions in which the work is carried out and effort. I won't go into detail with respect to all of the steps, because you have all of this in your copy of the Task Force report.

Another important feature is the joint participation of workers, their representative and the employer in what is called a pay equity committee. The two parties get together to develop a program: they determine the best applicable method of evaluation in that specific workplace, the method to be used for comparing wages, and so forth. This is not a negotiation; it is work carried out by both parties jointly on the pay equity committee.

The employer has an obligation to provide all the necessary information to committee members, to allow them to carry out their work. That means information on wages, and all the necessary data in order to measure the wage gap and correct it. That is an important obligation.

The Task Force also recommended the creation of an independent entity, to be called the Pay Equity Commission.

I will just quickly run through the primary differences. One major difference is that in the Act, achieving pay equity is rolled into the collective bargaining process. However, a fundamental right cannot be included in the collective bargaining process because, when negotiations occur, there are necessarily compromises to be made. For example, you cannot say that you're going to reduce wage discrimination by 5 per cent and leave it at 95 per cent because, in exchange, workers will have a shorter work week. That would be as ridiculous as maintaining a certain level of discrimination against visible minorities in the workplace, in exchange for a shorter work week, for instance.

A fundamental right, an equality right, cannot be subject to compromise. If it is part of the collective bargaining process, that will lead to endless conflict and we will find ourselves right back at square one, with disputes lasting 10 or 20 years.

One of the advantages of pay equity, as mentioned in relation to the proactive model, is that it allows you to avoid disputes. This model, which sets out all the benefits of pay equity, is discussed in one of the documents that have been distributed to you.

I would be happy to answer any questions you may have.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

Thank you very much, Madame Chicha, for this document. While you were speaking, I've been thumbing through it. It looks as if it's going to be an excellent tool for this committee to use as we look at the issue. You've broken it down so excellently into all its components as to why pay equity is important.

Now we will begin the questions, starting with Ms. Neville, for seven minutes.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Thank you.

Let me thank all of you for being here today. It's very much appreciated.

I think I'm probably the only remnant here of the former status of women committee that looked at pay equity. I think my memory is failing, but did any of you appear before the committee when we dealt with pay equity before?

[Barbara Byers]

No, at that point our officer responsible for our women's department would have been Marie Clarke Walker, who's the other executive vice-president, so she would have appeared. Sue Genge from our women's department certainly did, and Penni Richmond.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

You're probably aware, then, that there was a different government at the time and there was a commitment made by the government of the day to come back with a model for a proactive pay equity scheme. It was brought forward by then Minister of Labour Joe Fontana and then Minister of Justice Irwin Cotler. There was a commitment to do a consultation with the stakeholders based on their draft legislation.

Are you aware of that commitment?

[Barbara Byers]

Yes. I was there, at that meeting.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

You were. Okay. Unfortunately, our time ran out a little early, and we were not able to do it. I've asked, actually, if we can find copies of that legislation--I know it was drafted--to look at it as a model.

I have lots of questions. All of you referenced provincial jurisdictions and programs in place. The minister, in introducing this piece of legislation, has referenced provincial jurisdictions, to my mind somewhat out of context. I am wondering if there is any provincial program you would hold up as the model that a federal program should be based on, and what the most important components of that would be.

[Barbara Byers]

The two models we have referenced in our presentation and in the past are Quebec and Ontario. I know our sisters in those provinces would say the legislation still isn't there yet, but it's a long way from what women had before and it's a really long way from this piece of legislation. This legislation does not in any way resemble either the Quebec, Ontario, or Manitoba models, quite frankly.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

What are the most distinguishing features of those models?

[Barbara Byers]

For Marie-Thérèse, Gisèle, and I, the question of pay equity is dealt with away from the normal bargaining table. Certainly it's in negotiations, but it's not part of the normal bargaining. The union has access to all of the information about the pay scales, pay inequities, and all that sort of stuff. The employer is responsible for closing the wage gap. It's not left as a dual responsibility so that somehow the union is supposed to help pay for it.

There are timelines, and there is a pay equity commission that continues to look at this. There's a whole list of things that we gave in our presentation. The set-aside of money is critically important. You can't just put the money in and say, “We're going to the bargaining table, and this amount of money will go for the settlement. And by the way, pay equity has to come out of that.” It doesn't work that way.

[Gisèle Pageau]

There's also access to experts. You can't send pay equity to a body that knows absolutely nothing about it. That's a very serious issue. At least with proactive legislation it goes to an expert.

I want to make a quick comment about our sisters in Quebec.

Within the last couple of years, the Quebec government has done a study on their pay equity legislation. It's been implemented for a period of 10 years. One of the big concerns was that employers were saying, “If we implement pay equity, businesses are going to close and people will be out of work, so we might as well pay women a little less and keep them employed.” The study in Quebec found the exact opposite. Businesses did not close. It also found that if employers were not forced to implement pay equity, 85% of employers would not do it.

Those are very serious issues. I would recommend that our sisters from Quebec share that, because it's a very good study.

[Barbara Byers]

Another thing is that you cannot say this is proactive legislation, because it isn't initiated that way. It has to be initiated by individuals. Tell me one woman, even one woman in this room, who would go through 25 years of trying to fight for that kind of increase. They don't have the resources, the time--all of those sorts of things. This is not proactive.

[The Chair, Liberal, Hedy Fry]

I think Ms. Chicha wants to answer.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

I wanted to follow up, but go ahead.

[Marie-Thérèse Chicha]

The model recommended in the Task Force report reflects what was done in both Ontario and Quebec, and the mistakes that were made. So, it goes even further than the system that was implemented in Quebec and Ontario. Another important characteristic of the proactive approach is that it is extremely systematic. The evaluation method must be analyzed to ensure that it is not sexist. The application tools are also considered. In other words, this method is extremely detailed.

[Anita Neville, Liberal, Winnipeg South Centre, MB]

Can I ask a quick question before I'm cut off?

You talked about 25 years, Ms. Byers. The minister, in presenting his legislation, said that's exactly what we're trying to avoid, the 25-year....

Can you comment on that--