Human Resources Committee on Nov. 26th, 2024

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I would like to thank the two witnesses who, through their comments, seem to support the bill before us.

The Bloc Québécois, my Quebec political party, will also be supporting this bill, which aims to increase to two years everything to do with complaints related to harassment and violence. Currently, the Canada Labour Code only provides for a meagre three months. That's quite something. In Quebec, these initiatives have been taken because, in the world of work, we are often at the forefront. That said, some of the changes coming from elsewhere may inspire us.

I salute the sponsor of the bill, who was Minister of Labour in Quebec at the time of these initiatives, in 2018, when I was on the union side.

Mr. Thompson, I was very interested in your testimony. You did say that you were in favour of the bill.

I'm not asking you to compare Quebec and Canada. However, under part II of the Canada Labour Code, all new employees are now required to take training on the complaint, harassment and violence process. Members of Parliament must take training on harassment and violence.

In your opinion, are the current provisions for an investigation mechanism, a settlement mechanism and a support mechanism for workers who are victims of harassment and violence sufficient in the Canada Labour Code? Should other sections be amended to strengthen this part of the Canada Labour Code?

[Nicholas Marcus Thompson]

Thank you for the question. I think I got it. It was a little bit long.

I support, and my organization supports, this amendment. We think it would go a long way. But we are also calling for other measures to support the investigation process and to enable investigators to provide recommendations that are beyond the present scope. They would effectively provide individual remedies to the situation that go beyond restoration and go into the justice and accountability framework. That is the basis of our recommendations before you today.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Currently, there are no provisions regarding the role of investigators. Is that correct?

There are no provisions that allow for accountability and remedial actions, as you mentioned. Is that correct?

[Nicholas Marcus Thompson]

That is correct. The current legislation under part II in the regulations does not enable a third party investigator to make such a finding. They are only allowed to make a finding of whether workplace violence occurred or not, and what the broad recommendations are for the workplace. They are not directed to any individual. That system currently upholds the systemic issues. It allows wrongdoing to go unchecked. It doesn't allow for individual accountability.

That entire system is why, in part, we have organized and have filed a class action against the entire federal public service of 99 departments and agencies. It's because of the ineffectiveness of the current mechanisms, including those in the Canada Labour Code.

[Louise Chabot, Bloc, Thérèse-De Blainville, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Thompson.

Mr. Morin, you work for an organization that defends the rights of workers in these situations. It's often a very difficult obstacle course, sometimes physically, but especially psychologically.

The question of the time limit is obviously very important, but have you looked at the Canada Labour Code to see if we could strengthen other measures, perhaps drawing inspiration from what exists in Quebec?

[Yann Morin]

To answer your question, I'll continue in the same vein as Mr. Thompson.

In Quebec, there is indeed an investigation process, at the end of which an investigator can give recommendations, but they are not binding. The victim won't necessarily receive anything in return, and so won't necessarily benefit from this input. This is not the purpose of recommendations, which aim, rather, to improve the workplace. In Quebec, when that doesn't work, when the employee, for whatever reason, can't return to work, there are other remedies.

Let's take the example of a non-unionized employee in Quebec. He or she can file a complaint with the Commission des normes de l'équité, de la santé et de la sécurité du travail with a view to eventually going before the Tribunal administratif du travail.

There are then recourses available to get some justice for what you've suffered. We can potentially obtain compensation for psychological harm, or a rectification of our employee file if there have been unjust disciplinary measures. It can be compensation for lost wages, in some cases, punitive damages for the employer who would really be in bad faith, for example.

So there is this somewhat restorative part—

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mr. Morin and Ms. Chabot.

Madame Zarrillo, you have the floor for six minutes.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you, Chair.

Thank you so much to the witnesses today.

Witness Thompson, thank you for the work you're doing to really shine a light on the reality of workers in the public service. Certainly, it will really help any workers who work for federally regulated industries.

I want to go back to your words about accountability. I'd like to revisit justice and accountability as two missing points in this bill and the opportunity presented here to have them added. Given your knowledge, with the basic return on investment that an employer receives by taking all the risk—they're moving forward with all the risk, knowing that there's rarely justice and accountability—I wonder if you could share whether this is deterring workers from reporting harassment in their workplace experiences.

[Nicholas Marcus Thompson]

I believe it is. In our experience, and as a union representative representing many workers, when you share this process with workers, oftentimes it's case of, “Well, what's going to come out of it?” The fear is most often that nothing will come out of this: No one will be held accountable and the workers will not be made whole again.

The process feels very performative for many, many workers.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Just to follow up on that, I wonder if you could share with this committee some of the losses that those workers experienced—and not just monetary losses. What are all of the losses and risks they can potentially experience?

[Nicholas Marcus Thompson]

The biggest loss that workers experience is their mental health and that physical impact. This is especially when you work from home. Previously, you'd take it home, but when your home is your workplace, you live with that trauma and the impact on your family. That's a huge part of the experience of workers when it comes to workplace violence. It makes it even worse when you're experiencing this in your home. You have no safe space to go to. You can't leave it at work and come home. A lot of workers are working remotely.

I think the mental health aspects lead to physical illness as well. That accounts for a major obstacle for workers. I think every Canadian should be very concerned, because these are the workers who are showing up and providing you with public services, and they're working injured. These injuries are very real. The impacts on these workers are tremendous. Canadians are not getting full production. Canadians are not getting services at the level they should be when you have a worker showing up who could barely get sick leave, or when they are unable to perform at capacity. You as MPs would get feedback from your constituents of the services they're receiving from the public service.

No one is winning when there's workplace violence. No one is winning.

[Bonita Zarrillo, NDP, Port Moody—Coquitlam, BC]

Thank you for sharing that.

You know, this bill maybe will or maybe not make it onto the floor of the House of Commons, but I think what you're talking about has to be addressed. Obviously, you're taking action through legal action, which is very expensive and very costly. There's no way an employee could do that work on their own, so I thank you for that.

What recommendations could come out of this report in regard to protecting workers without necessarily getting caught up in the delays the Conservatives are causing in the House right now? What could we do now, as parliamentarians, to help?

[Nicholas Marcus Thompson]

You know, I often try to figure out why we have so many inequities in our public service. Why do we predominantly have one group in the leadership and others all below that? It has dawned on me that for members of Parliament who pass the legislation, often it's not a priority. It has not been a priority for Parliaments to ensure that these barriers come down. They're often enforced and reinforced by Parliament. Parliament has played a critical role in reinforcing systemic inequities throughout workplaces that the bureaucracy then enacts.

This body plays an important role in dismantling these. With regard to these recommendations that we've provided, presently there's no accountability for executives in the public service on these issues. It's not tied against their performance. It's not tied against anything. Their actions are optional. It's performative. They're enabled by legislation that says they have to do this, and they're able to check that box and that's it. They present numbers to Parliament that they're doing extremely well.

That's not the lived reality of many workers throughout the public service. Accountability is what these recommendations are calling for, and that's what you can do.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mr. Thompson and Ms. Zarrillo.

Mrs. Vien, you have the floor for five minutes.

[Dominique Vien, Conservative, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, once again, for your testimony.

Mr. Morin, I'd like to take you to a very concrete area, which is the time limit.

Actually, former employees have three months to report an incident of harassment and violence in the workplace. We want to increase this time limit to two years, which would give them much more time. Again, current federally regulated workers don't have this problem.

Obviously, three months isn't enough. We know that. However, in concrete terms, can you give us any examples of trauma or situations experienced by former employees who realized that something had happened when the three-month deadline had already expired?

I'm assuming that right now, you must be receiving federal workers who do business with your organization and are under the three-month time limit. You are in a position to differentiate between those who benefit from a three-month time limit and those who would benefit from a two-year time limit.

Concretely, which recovery period for which type of trauma means that the three-month time limit is bound to be exceeded?

[Yann Morin]

If you'll allow me, I'll answer with an example, as I feel it will be simpler that way.

So I'll take the example of a lady who experienced psychological harassment at work, without going into details for the sake of confidentiality. She really did develop a major depressive disorder, and by the time she was able to contact us for a little help, over six months had passed. Following the events and the end of her job, she needed all her energy to get out of bed. She wasn't able to look after herself or cook for herself. She had no support around her, and spent most of her days sleeping and trying to attend to her needs. As part of her medical follow-up, she was given antidepressants. However, it's usually only after four to eight weeks that antidepressants begin to produce noticeable effects and enable a person to function in life again.

By the time people get to us, they're starting to cope a bit. They begin to understand that something has happened to them at work. They're able to think about it and see that what led to the end of their job was really not right, and they ask us for help.

In the case of the lady in question, as it had taken her three months to manage to regain enough control of her life to successfully leave her home, it was impossible to take any action given that the deadline was also three months. Even on the side of our health remedies, whose time limit is currently six months, it was too late and there was nothing more we could do in terms of claims.

People who want to file a complaint about what they've experienced and who were working under provincial regulations have two years to do so. For them to file a complaint, they have to put their experiences on paper. So automatically, we have to ask them to relive the difficult situation they experienced.

This is the kind of challenge we face.

[Dominique Vien, Conservative, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC]

I don't know how much time I have left.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

You have one minute.

[Dominique Vien, Conservative, Bellechasse—Les Etchemins—Lévis, QC]

Okay.

I'll leave it at that, because I don't know if we'll have time for a third round.

I feel that what the government provided for in its regulations amounts to an admission that three months might be insufficient. It gave former employees an opportunity to file a complaint or a notice of incident once the three months had passed.

However, to use my colleague Ms. Chabot's expression, it's an obstacle course. People have to prove that a health issue or trauma prevented them from filing a complaint within three months. They then have to provide documents and medical exams to support their process, and perhaps even make a sworn statement before a notary.

There is, I think, a very strong element that tips the scales in favour of passing this bill, and it is this: Even parliamentarians have provided for an additional period for filing a complaint because the three-month timeline may be insufficient.

What you're telling us is actually what we're seeing on the ground.

Thank you, Dr. Morin.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Mrs. Vien.

We'll go to Mr. Fragiskatos for five minutes.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

First of all, I think Mrs. Vien's initiative is excellent. We discussed this after the last meeting. I sincerely believe that this is an excellent example of a private member's bill.

Second, at the last meeting, Mrs. Vien talked to us about the Quebec experience on this issue. She told us that Quebec had the same legislation.

Mr. Morin, what is your opinion on the Quebec experience?

[Yann Morin]

Thank you for your question.

I'm not really sure I understand exactly what Quebec experience you're referring to.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

In 2018, the Government of Quebec passed the same legislation with the same two-year timeline.

Do you have an opinion on the Quebec experience with the legislation?

[Yann Morin]

Yes, absolutely. I will tell you about my experience on the ground.

I started working with people experiencing harassment long before 2018. Despite the fact that we don't keep official statistics, I have to say that, when a case worker has to tell someone that they have no more rights because the timeline has expired, it is quite traumatic in itself. Nevertheless, that's what I had to tell people on a regular basis before the 90-day timeline was increased to two years. Every week, I unfortunately had to tell people that since they had let the 90 days elapse, I would have liked to support them legally, but I didn't see a solution for them.

Following the change that took place in 2018, I can count on my fingers the number of times I had to tell people that between 2020 and 2024. I'm not saying there aren't more, since there are certainly people who would need more than two years, but in our experience, it hasn't happened regularly.

However, the six-month deadline is still causing problems. Six months is not enough. There are still people who need a lot more than six months.

Obviously, between 2018 and 2020, there was a transition period. It was a bit complicated because the expired right could not be restored simply because the act was passed. Some people's 90-day timeline had expired when the act was passed, but the two-year timeline hadn't. They tried to file complaints, but they were rejected because the 90-day timeline was still in effect. As a result, we had trouble keeping statistics.

Once things stabilized and the timeline moved to two years, we saw a marked difference in the number of people whose timeline had expired.

[Peter Fragiskatos, Liberal, London North Centre, ON]

Thank you, Mr. Morin.

As far as I understand, you're happy with the two-year timeline, but you think it would be reasonable to set it at three, four or five years.

I also think that two years is a reasonable timeline. At the last meeting, the timeline was a topic of discussion. Why is it set at two years and not at three, four or five years?

What is your opinion on that? I think I know, but for the benefit of the committee, it would be good to repeat it.