I would expect nothing less than the experts we have appointed to pay attention to the research, including that which has come from the HUMA committee, on some of the more challenging aspects of modernizing the Canada labour standards.
The seven members of the expert panel bring a variety of different backgrounds and valuable expertise in areas such as labour policy, law, economics and business, and possess a well-rounded understanding of employer and employee perspectives. They've already been at work gathering evidence and engaging with a wide variety of stakeholders since its establishment in February 2019.
These are the questions that we've asked them to look at. One of them is the federal minimum wage. The idea of a federal minimum wage has come up a few times before. We'll leave that now, but there was a bit of a discussion about that in the previous election that was quite confusing to Canadians.
Other questions include the labour standards protection for non-standard workers, how we protect people who are not in a standard relationship with their employer. Also there's the ability to disconnect from work-related e-communications outside of work hours. Sometimes this is known by the phrase “the right to disconnect”. Of course, with an increasingly digital economy, there is some tension around employees having to be connected 24 hours a day and how to manage the needs of business with people's need to take a break.
There's access and portability of benefits, especially for people who have rapidly changing employment. Also there's collective voice for non-union workers.
Again, I'm looking forward to the results of the panel's deliberations and to see the advice that it'll be providing the federal government on potential steps that we can take.