Human Resources Committee on Nov. 21st, 2013

[Rodger Cuzner, Liberal, Cape Breton—Canso, NS]

The officers have actually reviewed all the cases they are referring to, and they say the number is exactly the opposite, or pretty close to it. In fact 75% of all refusals have resulted in documented enforcement actions. If I had more than 10 seconds, I could—

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

That completes the first round.

Now we move back to Madam Sims. I believe you're sharing your time with Monsieur Tremblay.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Yes, we are sharing the time. Thank you very much.

My question goes back to the discretionary powers of the minister. We have seen over the last couple of years this government putting more and more power in the hands of their ministers and therefore escaping what I would call parliamentary oversight either at committee or in the Parliament, and being able to make many changes.

This one really rang alarm bells for me, because it seemed to take away from the independence of the inspectors.

What kind of impact is this new discretionary power of the minister and the minister's being the ultimate arbitrator in this case, without hearing from the worker, by the way, because he's only going to hear from the employer, going to have on health and safety enforcement?

I'll start with you, Hassan, and then I'll go to Katherine. Give short answers, please.

[Hassan Yussuff]

I guess at this point, given these new provisions that are being added to the code, our observation is that clearly these changes have been made to ensure that the inspectorate will not be utilized as frequently to deal with situations in which a right to refuse has been invoked in the workplace. This would obviously create a bit of a chill. You can invoke it, but at that point, if the minister chooses to respond and at her discretion to dispatch an inspector, it will be very infrequent, because the government is making argument, obviously, that there is a better use of these resources and that the parties should try to resolve these matters by themselves before asking the government to interfere in any internal matters.

It's important to distinguish places, and I think Katherine alluded to this. Where you have strong and successful health and safety committees with both the competence and the training and a capacity to act properly, yes, it might be very wise, but there are many workplaces that are not unionized and where the workplace committee doesn't have the capacity or the training. Then you are at the discretion of the government as to whether or not they will intervene.

I think workers' health will be further eroded, given the new discretion that the minister has to make a decision as to whether or not she is going to intervene to dispatch an inspector.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

Katherine, give a short answer, because I want to give Jonathan—

[Prof. Katherine Lippel]

Very briefly, if I were a labour inspector, I would be very careful before I found that a worker was justified in refusing, if my job depended on whether I found something that was going to displease the minister.

[Jinny Sims, NDP, Newton—North Delta, BC]

That's pleasing, rather than health enforcement.

I'll turn it over to you, Jonathan.

[Jonathan Tremblay, NDP, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Thank you.

What are the consequences of withdrawing from the tripartite process, Mr. Yussuff and Mr. Bennie?

[Hassan Yussuff]

Hang on. The translation is not coming.

[Jonathan Tremblay, NDP, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Mr. Yussuff and Mr. Bennie, can you tell me what the consequences of ending the tripartite process will be?

[Hassan Yussuff]

I think my colleagues at the end of the table will speak candidly to this reality. We have had what I think is the most robust tripartite system in the federal jurisdiction. The code as it currently stands came about because of the collaboration that FETCO and the CLC and the government of the day had participated in.

For the government to depart from this I think fundamentally alters the balance of the relationship as to how we improve or even deal with situations in which there need to be amendments to legislation.

Had the government brought this issue before the tripartite committee and said, “Listen folks, we have a problem, and we think you need to figure this out and give us some advice as to how we are going to address it”, the process would, I think, have been very different, because the committee has always been consistent in its responsibility to try to find compromise, to figure out in what way we can perform.

I think this completely undermines it, and I'm at a bit of a loss to understand my colleague's saying that while in the history of our relationship we have worked to make this process a success, today through expediency we think the government is making a good decision, even though we've had no discussion among ourselves, much less a collaboration to say that this is absolutely crazy as a way to proceed.

The government recently went to the ILO to talk about how important this tripartite process was and the need for it to be relevant, especially in the federal jurisdiction.

[Jonathan Tremblay, NDP, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Do all of the witnesses share that opinion?

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

You have about 30 seconds.

[Jonathan Tremblay, NDP, Montmorency—Charlevoix—Haute-Côte-Nord, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Regarding the refusal to work, do people who believe that inhaling a product that could be dangerous to their health, for instance, lose that right of refusal with this amendment to the act?

[Prof. Katherine Lippel]

I will answer you briefly, since you only have 30 seconds left.

The text is so ambiguous that we don't know the answer. That is the problem. If people don't know, they are not going to exercise their right to refuse.

[The Chair, Conservative, Phil McColeman]

Thank you for that. That ends your five-plus minutes, because of the time it took to get the translation going.

It's on to Mr. Mayes.

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair, and I'm going to share my time with Mr. Armstrong.

One of the interesting issues that I heard in the opening statement was that the ratio of health and safety officers was 1:6,000, and now it's 1:8,000. At first blush, you would assume that workers' health and safety are at risk because of those numbers, but actually, if you look at a graph of where we've gone with work-related injuries in Canada, we've gone from a high of about 50 in 1990, down to 14.7 today. Therefore, it's not a direct relationship with the health and safety officers and the numbers of them, but more the consultations between the supervisor-employer and the employee who has worked. I think we heard that from the testimony of Mr. Beckett.

We seem to be stuck on the process here, but we're discussing the bill. I can understand there is a process that has been used in the past.

Mr. Beckett, have you ever said to a health and safety officer or to the department, “We're having a little bit of a challenge with the number of cases with regard to interpretations of danger that have maybe caused a lot of anxiety in the workplace, and maybe we need to tighten that up a little bit or there needs to be more clarification”? Have you ever said that to a department official who is doing an inspection or whatever, just to—

[John Beckett]

No. The short answer is no.

We have not had any consultation or had this issue arise in any of our conversations. Certainly, as it relates to the officers, in the carriage of their duties, I have never said to an officer that maybe they are interpreting the definition wrong. They have a job to do. We ask them to do it.

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

You feel that the right of the worker to refuse dangerous work has not been affected by the changes that are proposed in—

[John Beckett]

No. It's interesting you refer to the chart. The chart actually refers to all work in Canada, where the injury rate has gone from 50 per 1,000 workers to 14.7 per 1,000 workers. The majority of that work is in the provincial jurisdiction, where the proposals in Bill C-4 exist already.

I take a little bit of faith in the fact that the general responsibility system is working well in most Canadian workplaces, which is no interference with government officials, so that these changes, from my perspective, will have no negative impact on the rights of workers to refuse work.

[Colin Mayes, Conservative, Okanagan—Shuswap, BC]

Thank you.

I'll turn it over to Mr. Armstrong.

[Scott Armstrong, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

Thank you.

Mr. Beckett, you said you've been working under the federal jurisdiction guided by the Canada Labour Code for, I think, 13 years.

[John Beckett]

Correct.

[Scott Armstrong, Conservative, Cumberland—Colchester—Musquodoboit Valley, NS]

I'm going to read from section 132 of the code. I just want you to confirm whether I'm accurate in saying this is actually a section in that code:

...an employee who is pregnant or nursing may cease to perform her job if she believes that, by reason of the pregnancy or nursing, continuing any of her current job functions may pose a risk to her health or to that of the foetus or child.

She can cease that if she believes those things can pose a risk or a threat. Is that accurate?

[John Beckett]

That is accurate.