Yes, we have. In fact, the department produced a report back in 2013. At that time the minister was Kellie Leitch, who said, “In this study, we examined the link between the adoption of a mandatory vote regime and this decline in business sector union density.”
As I mentioned before, we've seen a decrease in unionization over the last few decades. We found the use of the mandatory voting, MV, regime has been an important factor in the decline in union density in the Canadian business sector. It was estimated that, had all Canadian jurisdictions not used an MV regime for union certification starting in 1997, business sector union density would have been substantially higher in 2012. Simulations show that union density would have increased by around half a percentage point from 1997 instead of dropping by four percentage points.
I'd like to table the report for the committee. I think it's very interesting to see the statistics on the effects of mandatory voting versus card check. The card check system has been proven over the years to be very satisfactory, very efficient, and democratic. It has worked well. The change actually reduced unionization.