Transport Committee on May 30th, 2013

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Is there a user-pay principle to cover the cost to the builder?

[Scott Clements]

For the road that would cross the Clearwater River, there is a proposal to make that a toll road so that the users pay for it.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

There are a lot of examples of private infrastructure combinations.

We have a private highway near Toronto, the 407, which has been very successful. Mr. McGuinty, who is giving a strange look to me right now for that, might find it interesting to learn that his brother, the premier, actually expanded the private road, the 407, after witnessing the success of private sector infrastructure. The number one shareholder in that road, it turns out, is actually the Canada Pension Plan. So when Canadians drive on the 407, they're actually contributing to their pension at the same time.

The Canada Line in B.C. had a third of its money come from the private sector. In Coquitlam, a pension fund that owns a shopping centre actually has agreed to build a station on the light-rail project so that it can bring more traffic to its retailers. So this is being done in other parts of the country.

Mr. Taylor, do you believe that we will see more attempts to impose construction labour monopolies across Ontario as we've seen in Hamilton and now Kitchener?

[Stephen Taylor]

The number of labour monopolies by jurisdiction are quite few. I mean, it does represent 26% of the population of Ontario, but jurisdiction-wise,Toronto being one jurisdiction out of many municipalities, there are only a handful of city councils that have approved this type of system or bidding process. But as to your question, which if you can remind me—

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Really, it is so easy for a union to certify absolutely every employee in the jurisdiction.

[Stephen Taylor]

I did refer to that, yes.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

They can do it with two or three employees, against the will of the remaining 2,000 or 3,000, and against the will of the local council, it turns out. Is it not safe to assume that this approach of enforced labour monopolies could be expanded, given the ease with which they've been imposed and the consequences with which they've been met?

[Stephen Taylor]

Yes, as the example from Kitchener-Waterloo illustrates, it's quite easy to go knock down jurisdiction by jurisdiction and bring them under that sort of scheme.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Right, and so we could be dealing with a much larger problem. Right now, about a quarter of Ontarians are living under construction labour monopolies and paying 20% to 40% price inflation on their local infrastructure as a result. Given that the entire province is under the identical certification scheme that led to these monopolies in Hamilton, Sault Ste. Marie, Waterloo, and Toronto, is it possible that other municipalities could fall victim to the same construction labour monopolies?

[Stephen Taylor]

Yes, it is very possible.

[Pierre Poilievre, Conservative, Nepean—Carleton, ON]

Then we could be dealing with bigger.... For example, Ottawa has a large light rail project coming. If a construction labour monopoly were imposed in this city, and if the consequential increase in price of 20% to 40% is replicated here, what would be the outcome, in your view, of the city's light rail proposal?

[Stephen Taylor]

Perhaps the light rail would not extend as far as previously planned. There could be cost overruns. The infrastructure dollar wouldn't go as far. It would be a bit of a political scandal for everyone involved. People would shrug and say, “This is politics as usual”. I hope Ontarians and the rest of Canada don't concede this. I hope that sort of fatigue hasn't set in, and that they're not willing to accept that. I do think that the end effect, particularly in the Ottawa case, would be that the light rail wouldn't extend as far as originally planned.

[The Chair, Conservative, Larry Miller]

Okay, thank you.

Mr. Holder, you have seven minutes.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

Thank you, Chair.

I would like to thank our guests for being here today.

You know, it's rather interesting. Over the last number of weeks, as we have studied this issue of how competition can make infrastructure dollars go further, we've had a wide range of perspectives. The Union of Quebec Municipalities was here, and CUPE, FCM, Merit Canada, Linden Concrete Forming, Canadian LabourWatch, Melloul-Blamey Construction, and Canadian Construction Association, just to name some. I share those with you because we have discussed at some length the issue of competition. Mr. Taylor, I understand that the National Citizens Coalition's credo says, and I'll quote from what I believe is your documentation, “free enterprise, free speech and government that is accountable to its taxpayers”.

I kind of have a sense of where you may be going in this perspective, but aside from just the issue of competition, making infrastructure dollars go further, one of the things—and I thought you started to touch on it—is the issue of fairness. I look at it, and frankly, to me, it doesn't matter who does the infrastructure work, whether it's labour, organized, closed shop, or open shop. That's not the issue to me if they all bid, and they all bid fairly. My concern is that when there is an organization that includes taxpayers who contribute to the moneys—and it is just one taxpayer who contributes those moneys that allow those projects to be built—and those taxpayers are somehow excluded because they aren't part of a group, and again, frankly, I don't care which group it is, to me that becomes an issue of fairness.

I've spoken in the past at some length about the moral imperative—in other words, the responsibility that we have as those responsible for the public purse—that there be a fairness quotient in this so that all qualified labour has the right to quote on this.

I didn't hear you comment much about that, but I would be grateful if you could give me some sense of your view on that, please.

[Stephen Taylor]

Yes.

Sir, it would also be an issue of cronyism. I've read of examples where, if only a handful of firms are affiliated with the particular framework in a municipality, it leaves nine out of 10 of the available workforce out of the mix, out of being able to bid for those projects.

You mentioned we're for free enterprise and free speech, but we're also for free association. Of course, these projects should be available to anyone who has the merit to bid on these projects, and municipalities should be able to associate with those organizations that can fulfill that tender.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

“Cronyism” probably isn't the word I would have used—

[Stephen Taylor]

Okay.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

—and I acknowledge that you do, but I sill haven't heard you talk about fairness. So perhaps—

[Stephen Taylor]

Oh, sure, I can talk on it.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

Would you? Because to me it's more like a human right, the right to be able to work regardless of your status within a closed or an open shop. Again, you may well have a direction due to your organization, but if your organization has a view on that from the standpoint of fairness, that's the piece. Fairness also then delivers some other things, too, as a direct result. Some of that might be absolute competitiveness. But I'd like to get your sense of it, if you do have a brief comment on that.

[Stephen Taylor]

I'll speak to the statistics; 31% of Ontario's workforce is unionized. At my count, four significant municipalities in Ontario have closed tendering procedures: Toronto, Kitchener-Waterloo, Sault Ste. Marie, and Hamilton, if I remember correctly. That means in those jurisdictions, seven out of 10 Canadians are unfairly excluded from that work, even though they pay their tax dollars into those infrastructure projects.

I think it behooves the federal government that is moving those infrastructure dollars to the municipalities via the provinces, whether or not there needs to be some sort of condition of fairness, to ensure that anyone who is able to fulfill the parameters of the request for that particular type of work, be able to bid on those projects.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

Thank you, that's clear to me.

Mr. Clements, you spoke quite affectionately about your airport authority. We have our own airport authority in the 10th largest city in Canada: London, Ontario. We're very proud of our own efforts as well, with what it has done. I say this with my great colleague, Mr. Preston, from the great riding of Elgin—Middlesex—London beside me here.

You've obviously had tremendous expansion or at least stressors to the airport, since obviously Fort McMurray is deemed to be one of the places where you're hiring and can't seem to get enough workers. With the growth you've had at your airport, has the construction around the airport where you've had responsibility been through an open or closed tendering process?

[Scott Clements]

Open tendering.

[Ed Holder, Conservative, London West, ON]

Has it always been such?

[Scott Clements]

I've been there just under four years, so I can state that for sure for four years it's been that way.