Evidence of meeting #69 for Transport, Infrastructure and Communities in the 41st Parliament, 1st Session. (The original version is on Parliament’s site, as are the minutes.) The winning word was union.
A video is available from Parliament.
President, Merit Canada
It says that there are to be no union-only processes and no sole-source contracts.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Larry Miller
If we could have that, maybe the clerk could distribute it to all the members.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
How much more expensive is it to ban union-free businesses from competing?
President, Merit Canada
On average, it's 12% to 18% overall. In specific regions where, say, 80% of all construction companies are union free, the cost goes even higher. In an area where you have 60% to 40% union free versus union, the difference is a little less. In the province of Alberta, where close to 90% of construction is open shop, when you have union-only requirements it's even more expensive because the pool of workers and contractors you have to go with is so small.
Conservative
Pierre Poilievre Conservative Nepean—Carleton, ON
When you have municipalities claiming they have no money and there's an infrastructure deficit, one area we might want to look at is eliminating that 20% price inflation that comes from banning the majority of workers from competing for construction jobs.
President, Merit Canada
Absolutely. There's an extra 30% to 40% that's just left on the table.
Conservative
Conservative
Mark Adler Conservative York Centre, ON
Thank you, Chair, and I want to thank all the witnesses for being here this afternoon.
This is a very interesting topic. I was intrigued by a number of things. There's one area that I want to get to, which a number of my constituents have asked me to bring up with you, but I'll save that for the second half.
I want to begin by following up on what Mr. Poilievre was talking about in terms of the 12% to 18%. You're telling me that as a result of this, my constituents in York Centre in Toronto are paying higher taxes, are having to live with fewer services, are having to endure crumbling infrastructure—and the Gardiner Expressway is a really good example of this—and are having to potentially pay road tolls in order to take advantage of new roads. This doesn't seem right.
How do I as a member of Parliament who represents them explain that to them? It doesn't seem fair. Could you please comment on that?
President, Merit Canada
I'd love to.
One of the things you could do as a member of Parliament is say to them that you don't have any control over projects the city and the province fund directly, but that, as their member of Parliament, you will ensure that the funds the federal government transfers will have strings attached to ensure that they get the best value possible, and also that all of your constituents are actually able to work.
Your riding, I suspect, is like most ridings in Ontario, where 70% to 80% of construction done is union free. Those constituents of yours who come and ask you why they are paying higher taxes may also ask you why they are unemployed now, because they can't work on that project, and it's the only project going on.
Conservative
Mark Adler Conservative York Centre, ON
I hear this all the time when I'm out canvassing or when I'm at events. People come over to me.
It's mainly the municipal taxes, property taxes, that are forcing people to dig deeper into their pockets every single year. They're paying more and they're getting less in return.
I remember we used to have garbage pick-up twice a week in Toronto, and on a third day we'd have recycling picked up. I remember being able to go to the skating rink at my community centre and not having to pay to use the ice. I thought this was all covered in my taxes. Now there are all these user fees that have been attached to a number of the services we thought were being covered in our taxes.
Municipal governments, and Mr. Poilievre made reference to this, are always coming to us and asking for additional funds. We have now indexed, according to inflation, the money that we are guaranteeing to them through the gas tax and GST. There's a whole pot of money out there. If only fairness was injected into the system, if only the right to work was made available to whoever wanted to work, we could save a lot of money, and we could have an infrastructure we could be proud of instead of one that's crumbling, without having to force our taxpayers to pay more and more in tax at the municipal level.
Is that true?
President, Merit Canada
I think so. It's one of many areas where municipalities can look for savings. There's a famous quote from, I think it was the chief of police for New York City, who said that he could easily pay for the police officers who are on the street, but he couldn't pay for the other three who are retired. There are a whole bunch of ways that costs can be contained. Open and fair procurement practices are definitely one.
I quoted the city of Montreal and the city of Hamilton. The city of Toronto is another one. There are potentially hundreds of millions of dollars that are being spent that could still be spent or that could be saved and diverted to two schools, as opposed to just one.
Conservative
Mark Adler Conservative York Centre, ON
A number of my constituents have major concerns about some of the activities of some of the unions recently.
Going back to when the check-off system was put in place by Chief Justice Rand, which is why it's now called the Rand formula, that money was to be checked off from union membership, to be used for collective bargaining purposes to advance the interests of the worker. It has now become a cash cow for a lot of unions that engage in activities that really have absolutely nothing to do with the collective bargaining process.
One recent example is the Canadian Union of Postal Workers. This caused a huge outrage in my riding. They sent a couple of people to what they call Palestine and said that the Israeli government was engaging in gross human rights abuses, and that Canada was complicit in this, and Canada, by virtue of supporting Israel, was committing war crimes.
This is the kind of thing they're using hard-earned money for, and workers who worked tirelessly have to pay into this.
I see you make reference to it here: the social justice fund, sports and entertainment fund, promotion fund. If I don't believe in the cause that my union is promoting.... A lot of the workers who came to see me, many of them postal workers, said that this is an absolute outrage and there's no recourse, but they have to pay this.
Could you comment on the activities of unions, and union dues going beyond what they were intended for?
President, Merit Canada
Yes. I've done a lot of commenting on the Rand formula, and I actually challenge most people who seem to know the Rand formula. I don't think any of them have actually read it. It's clear in the decision, and it was a decision for one union in one specific case to settle a strike. It was never meant to apply to every union. He actually said in the ruling that if this was applied to other unions, it would actually be detrimental to them because they were not mature enough to handle it. He also said right in the ruling that it's for the law of your employment, your union contract. It isn't to take forced dues from workers to pay for political or social causes. You cannot collective bargain away my political speech. It's just a fundamental principle.
To link it to the issue we're here to talk about today, that very union, PSAC, requires employers, the ones that have the exclusive right to bid on contracts that they let for construction, to actually pay into that fund. In a roundabout way, the federal government is giving tax dollars, which then are transferred into union dues that then go to pay for construction, that get diverted into votes for Gaza.
Conservative
NDP
Andrew Cash NDP Davenport, ON
That was a pretty outrageous statement. It's nice to hear the member opposite, Mr. Adler, talk about the city of Toronto. I think he's been here for a couple of years and I've never heard him mention the city. Now he's going after the taxes of the municipal government. Maybe you have it confused. Maybe if your government hadn't abandoned the city of Toronto, maybe the taxes on people's properties—
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Larry Miller
Mr. Watson has a point of order.
Mr. Cash, I'll come back to you.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
I've seen his tactics at heritage, too, Mr. Chair.
This is for questioning the witnesses, not the members on this side of the table.
NDP
Andrew Cash NDP Davenport, ON
I wanted to clarify one thing that you said about the police chief of New York or the mayor, who said that he can afford each police officer but not the other three who are retired. What would he do with the other three?
President, Merit Canada
I was only saying it's a huge strain on municipal budgets.
NDP
Andrew Cash NDP Davenport, ON
In my riding of Davenport in Toronto I have a lot of members of Local 183 LiUNA, Local 506 LiUNA, and Carpenters' Local 27. In my riding my neighbours on both sides are retired construction workers and they are in good health and happy. They can afford the homes they're living in, which in Toronto is quite a feat, as you may be aware.
In both those instances these are men that immigrated to Canada with very little education. One of the first things they did was to get a job where they were ultimately able to join a union. They were actually nurtured by the union. Their families were nurtured by the union. They actually integrated into the city and, in fact, made my city the great city that it is.
When I go door-to-door, I'll maybe knock on a door and there'll be an elderly man there who is in rough shape, the house is falling apart, and when I talk to him and ask him where he worked and whether he had been a member of a union, I can tell you almost 10 times out of 10, if that elderly gentleman is struggling or if his wife is struggling, that man did not have a unionized job when he was younger. His work was not in a unionized shop.
The point I'm trying to get to here is that while you say on the one hand you're into an even playing field and you're not trying to change anything about unions, you only want to be able to bid on their jobs at the same time you're trashing the Rand formula, as your friends in the Conservative caucus over here are, you're missing an essential point, which is that through their union, these workers contribute enormously to the communities in which they live.
You talk about these open-tender bids as though they're some kind of panacea for all that's ailing the economy. Meanwhile, today we see that the Conservative government has somehow lost and can't find $3.1 billion. So I think it's really rich to say that somehow all these problems have to do with unions.
In my riding in Toronto I have a lot of union members, many different kinds of union members. I have janitors who are facing privatization and the loss of their job security and the loss of their pensions. This kind of insecurity creates an unquantifiable amount of stress on people, and the expense that we'll incur down the road for workers who aren't properly protected is not factored into your bottom line, I can tell you that.