Public Safety Committee on April 12th, 2016

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Could I ask Dan Dubeau to begin responding to that? Then I may have a few remarks to add.

[D/Commr Daniel Dubeau, Chief Human Resources Officer, Royal Canadian Mounted Police]

On the exclusions themselves, if you look at the exclusions holistically for the RCMP versus other police forces, you will find that they are very similar to those of other police forces across the country. I'm talking about our major comparators. They are very similar. As well, they're similar to those of our colleagues in the core public admin.

Notwithstanding that you seem to think the exclusions are out of line, they're not. They are aligned to a police organization that you're trying to deploy, as our minister said, across a wide country and internationally, with unique needs everywhere.

As for resourcing, a discussion around resourcing obviously is a very complex one, but it's not one that is the RCMP's alone. It's one that would be Canada's, with the provincial jurisdictions as well as the municipal ones. Those discussions happen at that level. To have that in our collective bargaining framework would make it very difficult for an employees' representative group to come in and negotiate that, knowing that the provinces and the municipalities are not at the table at the time. That's why—

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

Again, I would say that one of the issues here is not so much that you want to be able to make all those specific decisions at the bargaining table, but it's that the vagueness of the language may well preclude being able to establish a kind of formal process for employees of the RCMP to be heard in those discussions. That would be an advantage, as far as I'm concerned, to bargaining. It would be an advantage not just to members but to the organization.

It would be a shame if vagueness in the legislation, which admittedly is being brought forward in a very rushed way, were to preclude that from being established at the bargaining table.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Could I add briefly to that, Mr. Chair? I know the time is limited here, but I have two points.

On that point, if you have specific concerns about the choice of phrase or language in a particular clause or section of the bill and have a better idea about how to propose more precise wording, we would certainly be interested in seeing the specific nature of your concern and how you would suggest that it could be better reflected or corrected in the legislation. Please offer that specific drafting comment if you have that, and we'd take that into account.

Secondly, on the issue of harassment, as I mentioned—maybe I should have emphasized this more in my opening remarks—there is a whole set of initiatives under way right now dealing with that very troublesome concern. The commissioner has taken some steps. There are independent review bodies that have been called upon to offer advice and counsel here with respect to four specific cases. Both the Prime Minister and I have undertaken to take those under account. We do not want to leave the impression that somehow here harassment is being overlooked or given short shrift. We are dealing with it, and there's more to come.

[Daniel Blaikie, NDP, Elmwood—Transcona, MB]

I wouldn't want to give that impression either, but what is the case with this is that by passing this legislation as is, government is precluding the idea that, through bargaining, whether it's around a process about how to handle harassment or whatever else, this could actually be a better way of dealing with some of these things, and you could come up with a better process at the table. We've had decades of top-down efforts—

[The Chair, Liberal, Rob Oliphant]

I'm afraid I have to cut you off there. We're about half a minute over.

Mr. Erskine-Smith.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thank you. I will pick up on the questions of my colleague, Mr. Blaikie.

The Supreme Court found that the previous labour regime was “more restrictive than necessary to maintain the Force's neutrality, stability and reliability”. I recognize that resourcing is excluded for specific reasons. Given binding arbitration and the additional factor of operational effectiveness to the RCMP that's going to be included and must be taken into account by the arbitrator, why would we exclude conduct, including harassment, from the bargaining table?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Those issues at the moment fall under the authority of the commissioner, and there were some legislative changes made a couple of years ago in that regard.

Plus, as I mentioned earlier, we have a number of initiatives under way, Mr. Erskine-Smith, in dealing with the harassment issue per se. There is more work to be done in that field. Both the Prime Minister and I indicated early last fall, shortly after the election, that these were troubling issues that we took very seriously, and we will have more to say and more to do on those topics as we move forward.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

It's the same question, but why would we exclude discharges and demotions from the bargaining table? Why would the union not have a say on those matters at the bargaining table?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Could I ask Mr. MacMillan to comment on that?

[A/Commr Craig MacMillan, Professional Responsibility Officer, Royal Canadian Mounted Police]

I think I'll try to address conduct and discharge and demotion in one answer for you this way.

First of all, the court was pretty clear that “[w]hat is required to permit meaningful collective bargaining varies with the industry culture and workplace”, so what we're having a discussion about is transecting the core public administration approach and the police industry approach in Canada.

I'm going to say that as a general matter—there are always slight differences across this country and that's why it's the Constitution and the way it's set up—conduct is dealt with legislatively in most jurisdictions in Canada because there is public interest involved. You want a set regime to deal with conduct matters, and that's the police industry standard. It's not bargained. Now, you may have little clauses and collective agreements that say you get notice or you get to have somebody attend with you, but as a general matter, conduct is not part of that.

Now, harassment, similarly, is not dealt with as a bargainable matter in most police jurisdictions. There might be clauses in collective agreements that talk about how in the police industry there shouldn't be harassment of union officials, but that's different from the conversation we're having right now. Again, the police industry doesn't deal with harassment as a separate matter because it's inextricably linked to conduct, so you have these regimes that set up the process.

I see that you're anxious for further questions, so I'll stop there.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Yes, and thanks very much, in part because I want to jump in on the reference to other police associations. For me, it's incredibly important. Not being particularly experienced in what other associations are doing, it would mean a lot in terms of my decision-making to see what other police associations do. Have you performed a comparative analysis? Are there other jurisdictions that have these identical exclusions?

[A/Commr Craig MacMillan]

Yes, we've done a comparative analysis, but here's the difficulty. You get to the same exclusions by different routes. Some are silent. Some expressly say that it's not negotiable. Some collective agreements say that it's not negotiable. Also, then, you have some where they might have some negotiation, but I wouldn't call it negotiation. It's like motherhood statements, or inspirational clauses, or specific things such as how the union will get notice if there's a conduct matter, or the union will be permitted to have a representative attend. That's a difficulty in making a blanket statement.

I would say that you get to this conclusion that, yes, there are things that are not negotiated, but are they dealt with as exclusions potentially, or is it silent, is it a management prerogative, or is it specifically said in the collective agreement that they won't deal with it?

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Would you be able to share that comparative analysis with us so that we could assess it and make our own determination?

[A/Commr Craig MacMillan]

Yes, we have that information available.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thanks.

[Scott Brison, Liberal, Kings—Hants, NS]

Mr. Erskine-Smith, there's one thing to note, which is that broadly in terms of the Public Service Employment Act there are exclusions—for instance, around classification of employment. There are also exclusions on pension benefits. So there are actually some, and these exclusions aren't inconsistent with those broadly which would apply across the public service.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

I think that's fair. I mean that's the hope: that there are different justifications for different exclusions. There's not a global justification for exclusions per se.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

We'll try to get some comparative information for the use of the committee.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thanks very much.

On that note, if there are other associations that do not operate with the same exclusions, I'd be interested to know if there's any evidence of problems in those associations and jurisdictions because of the failure to exclude certain items. If that's possible, it would be appreciated.

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

We'll pursue those issues and get the information back to all the committee members.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

I'd like to change gears a little bit and speak to the health care coverage. There was broad consultation regarding the government's response to the Supreme Court's decision. I saw that thousands of members were consulted. Was there any consultation with respect to the change of health care?

[D/Commr Daniel Dubeau]

No, there was not. When we went out with the survey, it was really specific to the labour relations regime.

Notwithstanding that, with regard to the changes to GECA and health care modernization, that's been under discussion since 2011, 2012, 2013, with the staff relations program, the labour relations regime of the day. It's not as though it was done in isolation. We were talking to the employee reps. We were working through this and we were leading ourselves down through it.

One of the concerns, exactly as our minister said, was that as we fell under the Canadian health care act, we had the changes, and we fell under provincial jurisdictions that, for occupational injuries, we were still seized with. The concern was that it was not neutral. It was within the organization, and it was not neutral. The appeals process was also within the organization. That's one of the things that got us to where we were going, to request the changes to GECA.

It's been under consultation for three to four years with our representatives of the day.

[Nathaniel Erskine-Smith, Liberal, Beaches—East York, ON]

Thanks very much. That's very helpful.

I have a final question on the GECA issue. It seems to me that this might be an item that an RCMP union would have a strong view on. If it is in fact such an item, why not defer this decision until after the union has had an opportunity to establish itself?

[Ralph Goodale, Liberal, Regina—Wascana, SK]

Mr. Erskine-Smith, as Mr. Dubeau has indicated, the process with respect to the health benefits has been under way and evolving since 2011. In 2013, at the request of provincial contracting jurisdictions, general health care issues were moved to the provincial and territorial health care plans. The occupational side was retained by the RCMP.

The experience since 2013 has been, as Mr. Dubeau has indicated, that the adjudication process is by definition a management process, therefore a one-sided process. It doesn't have an appeal mechanism. It's just not a sustainable administrative structure. The inclusion of the changes in this legislation were thought to be a helpful way to move forward at this time.

If you have a different view about the sequencing of events here, we would be interested to see your approach and your argument, but bear in mind the point that Mr. Brison mentioned earlier, that for all of the rest of the public service, this is the way the system functions. It seems to have functioned satisfactorily in relation to the rest of the public service.