Thank you, Mr. Chairman and honourable members. My name is Peter Barnes, and I'm president and chief executive officer of the Canadian Wireless Telecommunications Association. I too am pleased and indeed honoured to be here today to share our concerns about Bill C-257.
You should have in front of you a copy of our submission, which we filed with the clerk. The copy you have is in both official languages. We've also provided a copy of a report by Human Resources and Social Development Canada. It addresses many of the questions about investment and about strike duration and frequency, which I understand many committee members had asked about.
I'm here today to urge you not to proceed with this piece of legislation.
The CWTA is the authority on wireless issues, developments and trends in Canada. The association represents over 200 members in cellular and PCS, messaging, mobile radio, fixed wireless and mobile satellite carriers as well as companies that develop and produce products and services for the industry. Together, our members provide 95 per cent of the wireless services used by Canadians.
Our most pressing concern is for the safety of Canadians. We believe Bill C-257 will undermine public safety in Canada by preventing wireless telecommunications companies from maintaining the delivery of essential services to Canadians in the event of a strike or lockout. In addition, CWTA shares the concerns of other witnesses before this committee, concerns such as that the bill will significantly change the existing balance in part I of the Canada Labour Code without a full consultation; that a prohibition on replacement workers could lead to longer and indeed more frequent work stoppages; that Bill C-257 could require Parliament to pass back-to-work legislation in strike situations; and that Bill C-257 will damage Canada's economy, particularly with regard to small and medium-sized companies, as well as suppliers.
Recognizing their status as an enabling industry for all Canadians, telecommunications carriers join rail and banking as a federally regulated industry, bound by a range of federal legislation and statutes, in this case, the Canada Labour Code.
Nationally, Canada's wireless carriers employ approximately 15,000 people. Of these, the majority are unionized workers. Within each carrier, unionized workers undertake the majority of key operational requirements: including network operations — which includes the day to day maintenance and operation of the various networks provided by each carrier — engineering, maintenance, customer service, billing and other.
When I speak of wireless carriers, I want to emphasize that I do not mean only Bell, Rogers, and Telus. Among our membership, there are at least ten smaller regional carriers that serve communities like Thunder Bay, Kenora, or Prince Rupert. For these companies, the inability to meet their service commitments in a strike would be devastating to them—and to their communities, more importantly.
Canada's wireless telecommunications industry provides critical public safety and security services to municipalities, police, fire fighters, EMS, and to individual Canadians every day.
While most of us think of wireless telephony as being strictly a consumer product, wireless products and services are the backbone of the public safety and emergency response infrastructure in Canada. Wireless products and technologies are present in every aspect of Canada's safety infrastructure, helping hospitals, police forces, fire and ambulance services, and search and rescue teams do their jobs every day. In the case of police, for example, the various wireless services and technologies are part of the daily tools used by officers in the field. These provide uninterrupted, two-way communications between officers in a squad car under dispatch and services such as mobile fingerprinting, crime databases, and so on.
These, as I think you understand, can be a matter of life or death for officers in the field, allowing them to quickly identify suspects and be ready to respond appropriately to potentially dangerous situations within seconds. The majority of police forces use commercial networks managed by our members for these services.
Canada's wireless carriers currently meet the Solicitor General's standards of providing lawful access, upon receiving a warrant, to our voice networks. This means having dedicated security staff who work exclusively to provide police services on a 24/7 basis. We also provide a crucial role in assisting Canadians during emergency situations. Whether it was during the ice storm of 1998, the Vancouver mudslides, the fires in Kelowna, or the floods in Manitoba, wireless carriers were on the front lines working with emergency services personnel to provide a secure and fast communications channel for emergency assistance.
All of these services are conditional on having trained staff who can step in at a moment's notice with a robust, well-maintained infrastructure. In the event of a strike, with no ability to use any replacement workers except for select management personnel, wireless carriers would have grave difficulty providing these essential services. For these reasons, I would ask all honourable members to vote no to this bill.
I thank you. Merci.