Human Resources Committee on Dec. 14th, 2021

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

My thanks to the honourable member and thanks to him for acknowledging health care workers in his riding. I would add, obviously, the health care workers right across the country.

I'm thinking of what one representative of workers and frontline workers told me on my third day on the job. She said to stop calling them heroes and start treating them like human beings. That has certainly stayed with me. If you've heard a similar message, I'm sure it's stayed with all of you. We have to put tangible things in place to protect people.

That gets to the second part of this bill in dealing with the intimidation that many of our health care workers saw over the course of the last summer to the utter disgust, I think, of millions of Canadians. It's the clarification to law enforcement officers, so that they know exactly what they need to do and that the penalties would be increased. Importantly, it's that health care workers know in a very real way that the people of this country have their backs, that we support them and that we will not tolerate that sort of behaviour toward people in our health care system who we are asking so much of, particularly during this pandemic.

I may be betraying some of my own sympathies as the proud son of a nurse—that's how I was raised—but I think anybody who has benefited from the care, pride and dignity of our health care workers understands that they need that protection and that they should not be subjected to that sort of abuse.

[Tony Van Bynen, Liberal, Newmarket—Aurora, ON]

Thank you.

I've had the opportunity to contact Arden Krystal, the president and CEO of Southlake Regional Health Centre, in my riding. I asked her for her thoughts on Bill C-3. Ms. Krystal is, by and large, supportive of the legislation, particularly the changes to the Criminal Code related to intimidation and impeding access to services.

I am happy to see that we're collaborating on making this commitment we've made to Canadians a reality. Is it possible that there may be some confusion as to what the bill targets? Could you tell this committee what it doesn't target?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

I thank the honourable member for the question.

I will ask my deputy to give clarification.

[Sandra Hassan]

I will turn to Laurie Wright, the justice representative, to answer on the portion—

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

There's a clear chain of command here.

[Laurie Wright]

I'm happy to take my spot wherever that chain of command puts me.

Thank you so much for the question. What's very important to understand about the part of the bill that would create the new criminal offences around intimidation of health care workers and those seeking health services, and also the obstruction of those who are trying to access health care facilities, is that the focus of these amendments is on threatening and intimidating behaviour. We know that the obstruction offence does not apply to persons who are merely at a place to communicate information, so peaceful protest that is lawful and has only a minor impact on access is not going to be caught. As I have been able to state in response to an earlier question, this also means that people are able to exercise their labour rights, including their right to picket. As long as they're doing so peacefully, they're not going to be caught by the offences.

Just to sum up, the purpose is to try to capture threatening conduct where there is violence or a threat of violence, and not at all to touch on people's peaceful assembly and freedom of expression rights.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you. That's five minutes, Mr. Van Bynen.

We'll now move to Madame Chabot for two and a half minutes.

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

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

To follow up on the last answer, I will come back to the issue of protecting health care workers, professionals, those accompanying them, and patients. In principle, of course we agree that they must be protected. We have seen, although fortunately not on a regular basis, examples of protests, especially outside vaccination clinics. It is my understanding that these protests are being specifically targeted.

As I said earlier, protection needs to be guaranteed, because health care workers want to be protected, but they also want to advance their rights, which is a form of protection and a way to improve one's life and working conditions. To do that, workers protest, strike and picket outside health care facilities. Why consider adding offences? Will people still have their constitutional right to protest? We feel it's quite important to have that explicitly guaranteed in the bill.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

I will speak to it in broad strokes, Madame, and then I will ask Ms. Wright perhaps to get more specific.

Let me just say that it is clear in the bill that this is about the obstruction and intimidation of health care workers. They should not be in a circumstance where they are obstructed from performing their duties—and that includes entering the workplace—nor should they be intimidated in doing so.

We were clear on that and obviously, as the Minister of Labour, I share with my officials in the labour program a keen sense that we, in no way, want there to be any sort of infringement upon their ability to strike and to demonstrate in a peaceful way, but we want to be clear that the intimidation and obstruction of health care workers is not something that we will tolerate.

Ms. Wright, I will allow you to speak on this in a clear way for the honourable member.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Mr. Minister, maybe they could add that to a following question or another round. We're over time.

We'll now go to Mr. Boulerice for two and a half minutes.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Chair.

I will try to be brief. I have two short questions.

Whatever method is provided for an employee to accumulate their 10 days of sick leave, could we clearly establish that someone who has only used four days of that leave at the end of the year does not start from scratch in January, and that the six unused days will be carried over to the next year, up to a maximum of 10 days?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

It's carried over. I'm just going to look for a nod from my deputy here, but it is, yes. It's carried over, Mr. Boulerice. They don't start from zero. The intention is to make sure that employees always have 10 days, but that for new employees, it is accumulated over time. This is something they get, one for every month. As it's written right now, it's every calendar month, although, as I said earlier, we would be open to being flexible on that if it meant 30 days or a 30-day work period.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

I'd like to ask one last question.

If the collective agreement provides that an employee is entitled to three days of paid sick leave, would the 10 days provided under the law be added to that so that the employee would be entitled to 13 days, that is, the 10 days under the law and the three days under the collective agreement, or will accumulation be limited to seven new days of paid sick leave?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Again, and I will look for a nod from my deputy here, but I am fairly confident that what we are talking about here is the 10 minimum days. If they have three, we'll make sure they have an additional seven in order to make that 10.

[Alexandre Boulerice, NDP, Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie, QC]

Thank you, Mr. Minister.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Mr. Boulerice, you gave us an extra minute. Looking at the timeline, we'd have time for a five-minute round for the Conservative Party and five minutes for the government.

Minister, are you able to accommodate 10 more minutes?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Yes.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

With that, we'll go for five minutes to Mr. Benzen.

[Bob Benzen, Conservative, Calgary Heritage, AB]

Thank you, Chair.

It's nice to be here today in person rather than trying to make my way through an airport while the committee is in session.

Also, thank you, minister, for being here today.

I'd like to talk a bit about health care, which is really important. Obviously, sick time is important, but we really haven't talked about the cost to businesses to have this program in place. I'd like to make one comment about what I've heard here today. I don't think any of the benefits should be retroactive.

From a business point of view, if the benefits are going to start, they should start only going forward. I also don't think we should pay out benefits until they have been earned, because if we start paying out benefits before they've actually accumulated, it's going to be very costly from a bookkeeping point of view. If employees leave before they've earned the time, it just creates all kinds of problems. I think you have to earn it before you use it, and you can't use it retroactively.

In terms of what businesses are facing today, they're facing enormous challenges. We're talking about inflation now. That seems to be the big thing in the House of Commons. We know that's going to have an effect this year on wages for employees. They'll have to go up. Raw materials are going up in cost. Taxes are going up. Carbon taxes and environmental costs are all going up. There are regulations. Bank loans are going to be more expensive with interest rates.

Now we're asking businesses, and we've said that up to 58% of company employees don't have these benefits. These benefits are going to have to be a new cost. Have you thought about what the total costs will be, and how businesses will be able to afford this in order to continue to provide their services?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

Mr. Benzen, good to see you. We followed some of your journey yesterday. It was a bit shaky, but it's good to see you in person.

Let me assure you, first of all, and on a personal note, throughout the pandemic, for most of it because conditions were better here in Newfoundland than in most of the country, my husband was running a restaurant. I heard about the costs, sometimes onerous costs, on businesses, and how government programs were affecting his business every day.

I'll say that in a colloquial way, but I can also tell you that, from our department's point of view, we pride ourselves in not only spending time with stakeholders, unions and organized labour, but speaking to employers equally as well. Taking both of those perspectives into consideration is incredibly important.

As I said before, and I'll say it again, the last two years have shown us what the cost of not acting now could be: productivity loss, quarantine, shutdowns, lockdowns. The economic cost of inaction is far greater. That said, we recognize there could be a significant cost to employers based on how this is implemented. We also recognize that employers have unique needs. We need to engage with stakeholders, with employers directly and with workers as we move toward implementation.

We committed to convening the provinces and territories to develop that national plan, because it's not just about federal workers. It's about strengthening the social safety net for workers across Canada, and not just employers within federal jurisdictions but, obviously, those within provincial and territorial jurisdictions as well.

We have to get it right, and we need to get it done. I don't mean to be sweeping in that, but we know what a lockdown has done.

[Bob Benzen, Conservative, Calgary Heritage, AB]

When the businesses have all of these increased costs, the first thing they have to do is raise their costs to their consumers. That means, taking some of these businesses you're talking about, they're going to be competing against international companies that may not have to have this added cost.

WestJet might be competing against, I don't know, American Airlines, and Westjet may now have to have this extra cost that American Airlines doesn't. WestJet's tickets might get more expensive than American Airlines' and people won't want to fly Westjet.

Doesn't this also hurt the economy, in terms of potentially making us uncompetitive in some areas?

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

The economic numbers, from a macroeconomic point of view, speak for themselves. We have recovered in a more fulsome fashion, I would argue, than the Americans have. We've been able to get more jobs back and get more people employed because we took the significant measures that we had to.

That is not to say.... I'm not going to sit here and say, “Well you know, if you don't do it, the cost is even greater, so shut down”. In getting through it, there are still significant costs to employers, and we have to take that into consideration.

What I'm telling you is that, were I appearing before this committee in normal COVID circumstances, I would say, “Look, we're trying to get public health and public safety balanced with workers, but also with employers while making sure that we don't put onerous costs on them”. I'm thinking of small businesses, in particular. Absolutely, we're trying to get that balance right.

However, now with omicron, I am telling you that it is serious and it is immediate. While I am not taking my eye off implementation or the nuances of it, I am making sure that we do not add onerous costs to small businesses. I am telling you this is a very significant variant at a very difficult time of year. I would acknowledge that we're coming into the Christmas holidays, where gatherings happen, people are busy, people are out and people want to celebrate. The last thing they want to hear about is an impending variant and the government's response to it, but it's happening.

[The Chair, Liberal, Bobby Morrissey]

Thank you, Minister.

Thank you, Mr. Benzen.

We'll now move for the final question in this round to Mr. Coteau.

[Michael Coteau, Liberal, Don Valley East, ON]

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

Thank you, Minister, for being here today.

This issue is an important one to me, personally, because of the community I represent. Don Valley East is a great community, but there are pockets where there are low incomes—as low as $50,000 in family income per year.

During the pandemic, there were a lot of families that came in to see me—to talk to me virtually or by phone—about the impact of unpaid sick days on their lives. Only 42% of Canadians actually have paid sick days. I think the numbers were at about 42%. As one's income becomes lower, it actually goes down to.... I think at the lowest income it is about 10% with paid sick days. An additional 500,000 people getting paid sick days would be really impactful for many people in this country, so it's a great thing.

In fact, last year, I introduced a private member's bill at the Ontario legislature asking for 10 paid sick days, because it was something that a lot of people came to speak to me about. When you hear those stories out there, it really comes down to basic decency. It's about dignity. It's about making sure that a person has their back covered by the company they're working for, and that the government's putting out legislation that's actually aligned with where people are and the lives they're experiencing.

I was hoping that you could just take a few minutes to talk about some of those conversations you had with everyday Canadians, and about how this pandemic has impacted them, specifically, around paid sick days.

[Seamus O'Regan, Liberal, St. John's South—Mount Pearl, NL]

I'll use that quote again because it had such an impact on me. The quote was to “stop calling us heroes and start treating us like human beings”.

That gets to your point about dignity and the dignity of workers. I'm sure this is something that the committee deals with regularly, that is, talking about the dignity of workers and the dignity that should be afforded to them. I am here on this day to once again implore you of the urgency of this.

To your point, it is the individual decisions that people make every day and the multiplier effect of that through this country that will have a significant impact on how we deal with omicron and how we deal with COVID. To make sure that we do not go through the significant lockdown this country has gone through before, those individual decisions that people make when they feel they might have a symptom of COVID.... Unfortunately, too many are in a position where if they do not show up at work they could possibly not make the rent or could not pay their mortgage. They have to make a choice between a sick day and groceries.

Where we can we should relieve that pressure so that people can make honest decisions, based on the symptoms that they have, that they should stay home. Think back to the early days of the pandemic when we saw workplaces pinpointed and we saw COVID spread through particular workplaces when we could have minimized that. I would be the first one to say, yes, but here we are now, knowing that, having learned our lessons. As I've said, even a few days ago I would have come here with urgency, but today I come here with great urgency. I implore this committee.

I thank you, first of all. I know that you will be working very hard in the next 48 hours. I thank you for that. It is not work that is going to waste. This is more than just politics, ladies and gentlemen. Getting things like this done, right now, will have a deep effect, even in the next few weeks and months, I would argue, on just how bad omicron could be. We need to minimize it where we can. We absolutely do. It is here.

In our ability to deal with it, we have shown the world, to be honest, how well we can deal with this collectively. Again, the individual decisions that we make, collectively what a difference they make. Ultimately, what counts here are lives saved, the number of lives saved in this country. This will save lives in the very short term.

I thank you for your kind attention and for your concentration on this in the next few hours. It will be recognized and noted. I am deeply appreciative.