Evidence of meeting #11 for Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities in the 41st Parliament, 2nd Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site.) The winning word was union.
A recording is available from Parliament.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Phil McColeman
Mr. Boulerice, this is Mr. Cuzner's time. Please control yourself.
Liberal
Rodger Cuzner Liberal Cape Breton—Canso, NS
The Bankers Association, would they have been consulted?
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
I have consulted widely with the various stakeholders in the formulation of the bill. Some of those people are actually going to be here—
Liberal
Liberal
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
They voiced no reservations about the principle of my bill; they were simply concerned with the process.
Liberal
February 11th, 2014 / 9:10 a.m.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
The concern with the process was the process. You can ask FETCO what their concern with the process was. As a member of Parliament, this is the only process that I have, Mr. Cuzner, as do you when you table your private member's bill.
Liberal
Rodger Cuzner Liberal Cape Breton—Canso, NS
The province of Newfoundland has gone from the secret ballot to the card check system, and that was a Conservative government. What was the rationale for that province—
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
You'll have to ask the members from that province. You had an opportunity to put forward your witness list. If you didn't bring in somebody from Newfoundland to explain it, then that's your issue, Mr. Cuzner.
Liberal
Rodger Cuzner Liberal Cape Breton—Canso, NS
It wasn't really a list, it was more of a....
Academics Riddell, Slinn, and Lynnk are probably three of the foremost experts in this country on certification and decertification. Share with us the position they've taken on your bill.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
The positions that they have are out there in the public domain, Mr. Cuzner. If you want to have those people come here and discuss the merits, or the lack thereof, that you might think are in my legislation, then you should have invited them to this committee. I'm not here to repeat what others have said.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Phil McColeman
Thank you, Mr. Cuzner. That does help.
Mrs. McLeod, for five minutes.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
Thank you, Mr. Chair.
To the private member's bill, Mr. Calkins, certainly philosophically there are pieces that the government thinks are important and that reflect democratic principles. There are also some areas in which I think we will certainly be hearing from the witnesses and will be considering input from the witnesses.
I do have to make a comment, having seen the unionization certification and decertification process in work sites. I don't care whether it's the employer or the union, what I witnessed was a very important piece of the privacy of the ballot. The particular example I'm thinking of was in a health care setting. It was a very difficult choice for the workforce, and it was a very private choice. There were no pressure tactics from anyone, the employer or the union. There was a lot of peer pressure in terms of how some people were going to gain advantage by the change while others, because it was going to be seniority for chefs, were going to lose opportunity with the change.
Can you talk a little bit about not the union, not the employer, but how a secret ballot is important, perhaps for employee relations within the workforce?
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
Well, that's exactly what my bill is aiming to address. You've hit the nail right on the head. Not that I want to get into the weeds on this, but I've been a member of several unions myself. In some instances, I've been served well by that, and in some instances, not so well. That's fine. That's the process that we had. In none of those cases was I every given an opportunity to vote whether or not I actually wanted that.
It does create issues within the ranks. We may have differing views and differing opinions. Just like Canadians have every right to talk around the coffee shop about what their thoughts and feelings might actually be during a general election, they still have the right to go into a secret ballot booth and cast their ballot after they've heard all of the concerns from their friends at the coffee shop, from listening to the media, from listening to candidates at public forums, whatever the case may be. Everybody's had an opportunity to make their pitch.
At the end of the day, Canadian voters have that right at a general election to go in and cast their ballot in secrecy, in privacy, free from intimidation, free from prying eyes, and make the decision that's best for them. That is what my bill is seeking to do. It's seeking to do no differently in the workplace. You've got a pitch being made by a union that's doing the certification drive. They'll make certain claims that they're going to be able to look after the interests of the employee better than the current conditions. An employer should have every right, as the employer, cutting the paycheque for those individuals, to make a similar pitch.
The ultimate decision lies within the hands of the worker, to decide whether or not they want that. We should all be free to go make that choice, one that's in our best interest, free from intimidation and prying eyes from all parties that are interested. Ultimately, that power should lie with that worker.
Conservative
Cathy McLeod Conservative Kamloops—Thompson—Cariboo, BC
The last quick comment is on the issue of the secret ballot. You alluded to it briefly in your opening comments. It's not unknown in Canada. Certainly if you look at the provinces that already have secret ballots, I would expect they represent a considerable portion of the workforce.
Could you maybe just briefly address the concept and how provinces deal with it?
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
Notwithstanding the only example that Mr. Cuzner brought forward, currently there are five provinces—B.C., Alberta, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, and Ontario, I believe—that do have mandatory secret ballot votes. Federally in the United States, the federal jurisdiction, there are mandatory secret ballots when it comes to union certification and decertification. Like I said, in three of those ten provinces in Canada, the vote threshold when a vote is cast is 50% plus one of the workforce.
I put forward that the underlying principle, Mr. Chair, of my bill is the secret ballot vote. I don't hear any ideas for amendments. Nobody proposed any amendments. They simply voted against the opportunity to provide democracy for workers. If there are amendments that somebody wants to bring forward that are reasonable and constructive to the process and make my legislation better, then that's in the hands of this committee to decide, and it's in the hands of the House of Commons to decide after that.
I would certainly welcome constructive changes to the legislation. That's the goal of this, but ultimately, the purpose of the bill is to make that optional secret ballot vote mandatory and give the workers the right to that secret ballot vote to determine what's in their best interest.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Phil McColeman
Mr. Calkins, that's the end of questioning. Thank you very much for being here today and telling us about your plan.
Conservative
Blaine Calkins Conservative Wetaskiwin, AB
I appreciate that this is a divisive issue for some and is going to be hotly debated. I look forward to hearing whatever—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Phil McColeman
The committee will break now to move on the next panel of witnesses.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Phil McColeman
Committee, I call us back into session and welcome everyone back to consideration of Bill C-525.
For the next hour and a half, we have a full panel of witnesses who have joined us to provide testimony.
From the Canadian Labour Congress we have Mr. Hassan Yussuff, secretary-treasurer, and Mr. Chris Roberts, senior researcher for the social and economic policy department.
From the Federally Regulated Employers—Transportation and Communications, or FETCO, we have Mr. John Farrell, executive director.
From the Public Service Alliance of Canada we have Ms. Robyn Benson, national president; Ms. Magali Picard, regional executive vice-president for Quebec; and Ms. Shannon Blatt, legal officer.
Appearing as an individual we have Mr. George Smith, fellow and adjunct professor at Queen's University. Also appearing from Queen's University, by video conference as an individual, we have Mr. Kevin Banks, assistant professor, from the Faculty of Law.
Finally, from the Department of Employment and Social Development we have Mr. Anthony Giles, director general for the labour program, strategic policy, analysis and workplace information directorate.
I will now turn the floor over to our witnesses and remind them that we'd like them to keep their remarks to seven minutes in length. I will be indicating the time and cutting you off at that point, given the large number of witnesses we have today and that we want to leave time for questioning.
Perhaps we could start with Mr. Yussuff from the Canadian Labour Congress.
