Thank you.
The Communications, Energy and Paperworkers Union of Canada appreciates the opportunity to address the standing committee on this issue.
The CEP is one of Canada's largest sector unions, representing 130,000 workers in a wide range of occupations across Canada, including occupations in both the private and broader public sectors, such as media workers, workers in the chemical and energy sectors, pulp and paper workers, and telecommunication workers.
The CEP has a long-standing record of defending the human rights of its members and has an especially strong interest in pay equity matters. We are the first union to undertake joint union-management pay equity initiatives in several of Canada's private and publicly owned telephone companies, one of which took 15 years to conclude.
The CEP is grateful for this opportunity to present some comments to the standing committee, with the goal of achieving an equitable wage structure for both men and women in Canadian workplaces, and to explain to you just how inequitable and discriminatory the current act is and how it does absolutely nothing to achieve pay equity.
Sex and gender-based pay inequity is a human rights issue. It is the result of systemic discrimination and societal perception of the value of work traditionally performed by women. Consequently, to consider pay equity a labour issue to be dealt with at the bargaining table is not only detrimental; it's also an inaccurate characterization of the nature of pay inequity. Pay equity must remain a human rights issue and must not form part of a collective bargaining scheme.
There are number of reasons why characterization of pay equity as simply an aspect of labour or employment law should be avoided. First, to characterize it as such undermines Canada's international commitment to human rights, including equal pay for work of equal value. In a labour context, human rights are paramount, and parties cannot legally contract out of human rights obligations. Forcing pay equity into collective bargaining processes and out of the process of human rights risks the erosion, or bargaining away, of whatever pay equity gains have been made by women. The rights of disadvantaged groups and minorities should never be subject to the whims of the majority.
Secondly, the inclusion of pay equity as an issue to be negotiated through collective bargaining ignores the systemic and encompassing nature of pay inequity. The systemic discrimination is reflected not just in the organization of workplaces, but also in the structure and the strength of bargaining units and unions. Bargaining units that are predominantly female may invite the replication of patterns and perceptions, or gender segregation, and the undervaluing of work. This lends itself to an inherent, though sometimes unconscious, power imbalance at the bargaining table, thereby undermining the principles that pay equity attempts to promote.
The CEP advocates a comprehensive and collaborative model of pay equity legislations for all workplaces, whether private or public. While the CEP believes that individuals should have a mechanism available to them whereby complaints can be initiated, the CEP acknowledges that a complaint-based system alone cannot ensure compliance with pay equity. Instead, the CEP envisions a more proactive pay equity scheme. This would include a positive duty on employers to review organizational wage structures and to remedy gender-biased pay practices.
The CEP also believes, however, an audit system would help to ensure adherence to a more proactive approach to pay equity. Audits must be conducted thoroughly and consistently to ensure a seamless continuity of pay equity throughout the federal sphere. In addition, employers must provide realistic and tangible timelines for the implementation of equitable wage structures and payouts for past discriminatory practices.
It is the view of the CEP that pay equity is not a one-time remedy, but rather that it must be examined frequently in the workplace. This is to ensure that employers are complying with pay equity regardless of the economic and social climate, which may serve to inadvertently, yet adversely, affect ongoing pay equity initiatives.
The idea is that concepts of pay equity are not stagnant, and fluctuate with ever-changing notions of equality and emerging trends in the workplaces.
The CEP advocates for greater participation of unions to ensure that the goal of pay equity is attained in the workplace. It should be noted that increased union participation cannot be equated with the union's responsibility for a compensation perspective. The employers pay wages, and are solely responsible for non-discriminatory compensation practices. The inherent power imbalance within the employer-union relationship, and the fact that ultimately employers hold the purse strings, precludes unions from liability for pay equity. This is consistent with union advocacy for equitable wage structures. Furthermore, the thrust with the current legislation, which holds employers solely responsible for discriminatory wage differences, should not be altered.
Finally, our own CEP telephone operators lived through 15 years of game-playing by their employers as a result of inadequate legislation. The CEP fought long and hard to bring pay equity to 4,700 telephone operators, of whom about 18% died before ever seeing a dime.
We all know what needs to be done. As you are all aware, the pay equity task force has exhaustively studied this issue. Several years ago, almost 200 people gave oral presentations. There were 60 written submissions from groups across the country. There were five round tables with multi-stakeholder groups, and the task force looked at proactive pay equity legislation in a number of jurisdictions in Canada to identify best practices. This government does not need to reinvent the wheel on this issue.
Instead of implementing this appalling and regressive act, I call on the Government of Canada to step up to the plate and do what is right and long overdue for the women of Canada, and that is to simply implement the recommendations of the pay equity task force.
Merci.