Human Resources Committee on Dec. 7th, 2006

[Yves Lessard, Bloc, Chambly—Borduas, QC]

Mr. Chair, I'd like to let Ms. Carbonneau have a chance to speak.

It is important to remember that witnesses live in Quebec and represent Quebec businesses. They have testified as to their experience in Quebec and they are not able to give us a single example of anti-scab legislation leading to the kind of disaster being predicted. That is what we are trying to say.

I don't want to be too hard on Mr. Kelly-Gagnon, but we're giving him an opportunity to answer our question, and he has chosen not to do so.

Ms. Carbonneau.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

That's all the time you have, Mr. Lessard.

I'll let Ms. Carbonneau finish her response.

[Claudette Carbonneau]

This has already been said, Mr. Chair. But I wanted to stress that Telus is a federally regulated company.

[Michel Kelly-Gagnon]

In Quebec, there have also been cases where call centres haven't worked out and have had to close up shop.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Mr. Martin, five minutes, please.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you very much.

I'm trying to understand the nature of the fear being presented here this morning. I hear Mr. Lotito say he's found a way to work with his workers and to find agreements and move forward. It's my experience with both management and workers that people are reasonable. They try to find ways to sort things out, particularly if there's a possibility of danger. As a matter of fact, a lot of the health and safety initiatives in this country have been driven oftentimes by labour management groups that focus on that, with participation by workers.

At my own airport, for example, I had a call just recently, not from the management but the workers there. There was only one firefighter on the property at the Sault Ste. Marie airport, and soon to be none. They are going to have to depend on a fire service that's twenty minutes away. This isn't a decision that was made by the workers; this is a decision that was made by management in order to deal with a budget. In my view, that's totally unacceptable.

To René or Monique or Yvon, is it your experience that workers would be irresponsible, in circumstances where we have anti-replacement workers, in light of some of these emergency requirements or where people's lives might be at stake? Or is it your experience, in negotiating with employers, that in fact those are the very things that sometimes come to the table and are dealt with before you deal with anything else?

Maybe you would talk about that. There's this sense that workers are going to be irresponsible.

[René Roy]

Absolutely not. That is not what experience has shown. It is not the right to strike that is being challenged, but rather the right to hire replacement workers. I can give you some examples, such as what happened with the Quebec Government. When it called for central services to be defined, it asked for 110% of the staff to be involved to meet essential services and therefore required to work. It simply showed that there were too few workers in the health sector.

Take the example of the health system, where people are very vulnerable. It was easy to find workers to meet essential needs in Quebec hospitals without creating any kind of a disaster.

[Jim Facette]

Just for the record, Mr. Chair, to make sure we have it straight, I spoke about civil aviation regulations. The decisions and the regulations of firefighting standards are set by Transport Canada. There is a new set of firefighting standards that Sault Ste. Marie airport will be adhering to that will require them to have the new set of firefighting and rescue operations that they've decided on.

So it is not just the airport that makes those decisions, Mr. Chair, for the record.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Thank you. We'll certainly be following up on that.

In your experience, Mr. Lotito, are your employees responsible citizens of this country? For example, when that plane went off the runway, did your workers come to the table and ask how they could help?

[Vito Lotito]

Absolutely. The Air France incident was at 3 p.m. or 4 p.m., at a change in shift, and we had 135 additional workers helping out.

[Tony Martin, NDP, Sault Ste. Marie, ON]

Are you as anxious as the others are here, in light of this legislation that would not allow for replacement workers, that in fact in those circumstances your workers would be irresponsible?

[Vito Lotito]

They are responsible people, but we are against this piece of legislation. We believe the equilibrium will be totally taken away.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Ms. Carbonneau.

[Claudette Carbonneau]

I cannot believe that people who work to help people in the health system become monsters when there is a labour dispute. Our experience shows that the reverse is true.

I would like to remind you that the concept of essential services in the health sector was initially a demand by workers, which developed during the first provincial strikes. They tried to impose it and in some cases they took steps to have the lock-out right of health care employers eliminated.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Mr. Martin, that's all the time we have, and Mr. Moreau wanted to say a quick word.

[Yvon Moreau]

Mr. Martin, as I said a little earlier when I spoke in response to Ms. Lavallée, we would have hoped, as employees at Radio Nord Communications, for there to be no replacement workers from 2002 to 2004, when we were in a labour dispute. That way, we could have continued to dialogue and work to resolve the dispute.

I would like to highlight the fact that our labour dispute at Radio Nord Communications was not about wages. We were not asking for better pay; we were not trying to stuff our wallets. The dispute initially came about because, as people working in the communications trades in Abitibi-Témiscamingue, we wanted people in our region to have better radio and television services. That was the source of our labour dispute.

Mr. Martin, I would say to you that if bill C-257 is passed then if the workers at Radio Nord Communications have to faced the same situation some day, they will be able to talk with their bosses and everyone on both the union and management side will have to work out their conflicts and their differences as all reasonable people do in normal situations.

The current situation is like telling a man who is having marital problems that he can take a mistress thereby avoiding to solve his problem.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Mr. Moreau.

I know Madame Allard just wanted a quick comment.

[Monique Allard]

I would like to respond to Mr. Martin and talk about the sense of responsibility that workers feel in the case of emergency services.

I would remind you that when the last strike took place, in 1991, despite the fact that the employer was using scabs—I use that word because I think that it is more suitable—it was not able to provide the public with good service, particularly when it came to delivering old age pension cheques and welfare cheques. We asked Canada Post to deliver the cheques to these people but the corporation refused. Since it was not able to provide the service, Canada Post finally agreed and it was the letter carriers and clerks who finally went in to work during the strike to sort the mail and help those who were expecting cheques.

That is what I wanted to tell you with respect to the sense of responsibility that workers feel.

[The Chair, Conservative, Dean Allison]

Thank you, Madame Allard.

The last questioner is Ms. Yelich.

You have the floor, Ms. Yelich.

[Lynne Yelich, Conservative, Blackstrap, SK]

I just want to make a comment and then I'll defer to Mr. Lake.

On that point, it's true, I think labour is really very concerned.

I wanted to just give you the scenario that happened in Saskatchewan, when their employer was the Saskatchewan government and the nurses got locked out. They really cared very much about those patients, and those patients got flown out of province and flown out of the country to be served. So you have to wonder whose interests were best served at that time, because the nurses wanted to and they were locked out. It did get ugly, and there was no replacement legislation in place.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I want to start by making a comment on something Mr. Martin said. He talked about people being reasonable. I just want to point out that generally people on both sides of the issue are reasonable. I think that's fair to say, but we still need rules. And quoting from the Sims report, it said:

A labour code must be careful to maintain the natural balance of power. Any legislative scheme which tips that balance leads to uncertainty, instability and discontent.

I just want to remind everybody of that.

One of the things that I hear over and over again is this concept of fearmongering. I think we need to differentiate between fear and a legitimate concern for Canadians. I think what I'm hearing articulated, both in this meeting and previous ones, is a legitimate concern. And let's make sure we're not getting overly political in our comments on it. There is a legitimate concern for Canadians and for the economy here.

This question is for Mr. Kelly-Gagnon. I listened to Mr. Lessard and Ms. Lavallée, at different points, in different meetings, and it seems that they don't understand the differences between federal and provincial jurisdiction. Could you explain the differences in industries regulated by the two jurisdictions and why shutting down federal industries would shut down, or could shut down, Main Street, Canada?

[Michel Kelly-Gagnon]

Thank you.

Provincially regulated companies and our members are in the business of the production of private goods. If their manufacturer or company is shut down, there can be the consequence of having the business shut down, but it's not more than that.

By the way, I was asked by the gentleman from the Bloc to give additional examples. Mr. Chairman, they are

Direct Film; Biscuits David Ltd.; Magasins Continental Ltd., Victoriaville store; Zellers Ltd., Chicoutimi store.

These are court cases. I cannot discuss the private cases of private members, but I'm allowed to mention these court cases.

Your point is a good one, in the sense that if there's a provincially regulated company that gets shut down because of a strike, it's “only” their clients or suppliers, and the people related to their business, who will suffer the economic consequences. I'm saying “only”. It's still a grave consequence, but it's a consequence that I think cannot be compared to the consequence of having CN or Air Canada in a strike, with no rights for additional options.

Also, it cannot be compared to a situation where a cable company is on strike and people from a region would be without access to their cable. They would incur millions of dollars in lost or delayed transactions, if nobody could repair the cables that were damaged.

These are very different situations from a private company producing a private product. I hope this subtlety will be understood by as many members of the committee as possible.

[Mike Lake, Conservative, Edmonton—Mill Woods—Beaumont, AB]

I have a question for Mr. Facette. Yesterday I found that one of our witnesses, Mr. Forder from CAW, was very honest with us. I think he got to the real reason why there's support for this legislation on their side. He said:

If the operation can't function with replacement workers, that's fine with us. We'll be able to get a settlement earlier. That's something all members should be interested in pursuing. That's the whole purpose of the legislation.

Basically if we can shut everything down, we'll win faster.

Can you comment on that, and how it might affect your industry and your ability to negotiate?

[Jim Facette]

If they have the ability to shut us down, it's going to be very difficult to negotiate in a reasonable, respectful way, which Mr. Lotito alluded to earlier. It makes things rather difficult.

Mr. Lotito is at the table, so I'll let him go further from there.

[Vito Lotito]

Negotiating a contract is not a science. It's more of an art, and it's based on relationship. My comment is that I don't believe so.