Good morning, Mr. Chair.
I'm Chad Stroud, the president of Unifor Local 2182. I represent the marine communication and traffic service operators of the coast guard. We are an essential service at this time.
Unifor is Canada's largest private sector union with more than 300,000 members. It also represents public service employees such as my group, the printing services group, non-supervisory employees, Transport Canada air traffic control employees, and the House of Commons technical group.
Unifor brings a modern approach to unionism: adopting new tools, involving and engaging our members, and always looking for new ways to develop the role and approach of our union to meet the demands of the 21st century.
Unifor objects to the amendment of important labour relations legislation, without full consultation with stakeholders, by way of an omnibus budget bill. We feel it is important to register our concerns regarding the process through which federal budget legislation has been implemented in recent years.
We are especially concerned with measures that affect collective bargaining legislation and changes in very important health and safety regulations and practices defined under multiple pieces of legislation.
In our view, it is entirely inappropriate to implement important policy changes on matters such as these through a composite budget implementation bill without full research, consideration, or fine tuning, and with debate frequently ended through invoking closure.
The Public Service Labour Relations Act, in its enactment in 2003 as part of the Public Service Modernization Act, followed extensive consideration and consultation beginning in 2000. The PSLRA then featured a mandatory five-year review. That five-year review resulted in the “Report of the Review of the Public Service Modernization Act, 2003”, which was released in 2011. That report followed appropriate consultation by the review team.
Notably, the amendments to the PSLRA now set out in Bill C-4 are not amendments that were recommended by the review team after consultations with all stakeholders and careful review of the PSLRA. The amendments now set out in Bill C-4 are not the product of any consultative process.
Clause 294 of Bill C-4 would amend the PSLRA by deleting the existing definition of essential service as
a service, facility or activity of the Government of Canada that is or will be, at any time, necessary for the safety or security of the public or a segment of the public.
It would replace that definition with one that describes an essential service as anything that the government in its exclusive right determines will be necessary for the safety or security of the public or a segment of the public.
Clause 305 of Bill C-4 would amend sections 119 to 134 of the PSLRA to provide that the employer will unilaterally determine what is an essential service and what level of essential services will be supplied during a labour dispute.
Unifor and other bargaining agents can have no confidence that the unilateral power that Bill C-4 would grant the government to determine what is an essential service will not be abused in the absence of a cooperative effort to identify real essential services that ought to continue during a labour dispute, assisted where necessary by the PSLRB.
The proposed amendments to section 103 of the PSLRA will eliminate interest arbitration as one of the two methods a bargaining agent may, as a right, select as the process for the resolution of collective bargaining disputes. Instead, all disputes will by default proceed by the conciliation and strike/lockout process, absent an agreement between the bargaining agent and the employer to use arbitration as the process.
Unifor is troubled by these amendments that will erode the independence of interest boards of arbitration. Clause 310 of Bill C-4 proposes to add new section 158.1, which directs the chair of the Public Service Labour Relations Board to review arbitration awards to determine their compliance with the listed criteria in section 148 and permits the chair to direct the board of arbitration to review its decision and to provide further justification on a new decision. Vesting such a power of review in the chair of the Public Service Labour Relations Board would raise real concerns about the independence of the arbitration process as a legitimate process for the resolution of collective bargaining disputes and real concerns about the fairness of proceedings in which parties may be deprived of an opportunity to be heard before an award is reviewed and amended.
Unifor does not support the elimination of the compensation analysis and research services. Such services are within the board's current mandate and would be eliminated by clauses 295 and 296 of Bill C-4.
Unifor opposes the restriction on union policy grievances that could be the subject of an individual grievance. This appears to be a measure that could force bargaining agents to file—