This is in a section of an IBEW collective agreement in Ontario.
Of every hour worked, $1.08 is put into the market recovery fund, and 60 cents per hour goes into the stabilization fund. Money goes into the sports, entertainment, and retiree fund; into the education fund; into the promotion fund.
What is the taxpayer doing funding the union's sports and entertainment fund, let alone these funds with big dollars in them?
Someone told me that here in Ottawa the electrical workers have—I don't know whether this number is true or not—something like $15 million in their fund, which they can use to subsidize a contractor who is bidding against other contractors who are bidding at a lower ultimate cost of doing the project. They'll meet that bid by taking this money, which has been strong-armed through collective agreements like this over the years, in order to “level the playing field”. This means that the taxpayer is being ripped off to an even greater degree, with this money that has been built up in these funds over the years.