Okay.
Evidence of meeting #71 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 work.
A video is available from Parliament.
Evidence of meeting #71 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 work.
A video is available from Parliament.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
4:50 p.m.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
Thank you very much, Mr. Chair, and thank you to the witnesses for being here.
Forgive me, but I'm not sure whether it was Mr. Atkinson or Mr. Reid who talked about the difference between the craft shops and non-union contractors in the ability to multi-task, the freedom to have people move around the site and do various tasks.
In that freer situation, is there a concern or a possibility that an unskilled individual might do the work of a skilled individual, work that he or she is not competent to do, and jeopardize or compromise the quality of the work?
4:50 p.m.
Director, Federal and Ontario, Progressive Contractors Association of Canada
No.
4:50 p.m.
Director, Federal and Ontario, Progressive Contractors Association of Canada
What I'm referring to are the more rudimentary things that need to get done, like moving stuff out of the way in order for people to do their job. This is not about somehow doing work that somebody is not qualified or certified to do. That's what certifications are for; that's what licensing is for. This is about the frankly mundane work of just being able to do your job without having to wait for somebody else to do theirs.
4:50 p.m.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
I suppose, but I can see the possibility that someone could overstep his or her bounds and there could be a problem.
Now, Mr. Kooy, I don't know much about CLAC. I'm awfully sorry, but I'm not terribly familiar with it, so I have some questions about it.
Recently the government moved a private member's bill to compel unions to do a lot of reporting in terms of how they undertake their business. I'm wondering how you feel about the reporting requirements in that new legislation. Are they going to impact your members? Are they going to impact you and, if so, in what way?
May 9th, 2013 / 4:50 p.m.
Regional Director, Eastern Ontario, Christian Labour Association of Canada
CLAC would be subject to the exact same reporting requirements as any other trade union in Canada under Bill C-377. When the bill was first introduced, we certainly did make submissions to the government in terms of some flaws that we saw with the bill. But to answer your question, we would be subject to the exact same reporting requirements.
4:50 p.m.
Regional Director, Eastern Ontario, Christian Labour Association of Canada
Basically—
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
Jeff Watson Conservative Essex, ON
Mr. Chair, on a point of order, we're not having an examination of Bill C-377. We are talking about how to make infrastructure dollars go a little further.
I think the first question was definitely in line, and I wasn't intervening on a point of order at that point, but this conversation is now departing from the actual study. Now she wants commentary on Bill C-377.
4:50 p.m.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
Mr. Chair, I didn't interfere in Mr. Watson's lines of questioning, and I don't expect him to interfere in mine.
4:50 p.m.
Conservative
The Chair Conservative Larry Miller
I think he's just raising a point that we remain on a topic today, so I'll ask that you stick to that topic as much as possible. Bill C-377 isn't before us.
4:50 p.m.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
Would Bill C-377 interfere with your ability to bid competitively to have the access you're looking for?
4:55 p.m.
Regional Director, Eastern Ontario, Christian Labour Association of Canada
No.
4:55 p.m.
NDP
4:55 p.m.
Regional Director, Eastern Ontario, Christian Labour Association of Canada
Not related to the subject matter here today. No.
4:55 p.m.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
Okay.
Again, I'm not entirely familiar with CLAC. In terms of your policies and how you and your union support workers, obviously if you're going to be competitive and able to get the contracts that you deserve, you need to have a good relationship with your workers. For example, how do you support bargaining and how do you feel about back-to-work legislation, or anti-scab legislation, things like that?
4:55 p.m.
Regional Director, Eastern Ontario, Christian Labour Association of Canada
I'll address the question about collective bargaining and try to bring it back to this context by saying that we negotiate very competitive collective agreements. We certainly believe in workers being paid fair market wages. In the construction industry, as it relates to work on infrastructure projects, our members are paid very competitively, sometimes even above the wages that the international building trades unions negotiate.
4:55 p.m.
NDP
Irene Mathyssen NDP London—Fanshawe, ON
I appreciate that very much.
That kind of comes back to what Madame St-Denis was talking about. When you talk about unfair competition, it's not about wages; it's not the compensation that workers get. So where does the unfairness come from? Why would a cost overrun of 40% exist with a trade union group that you would regard as having unfairly gained a contract?
4:55 p.m.
Regional Director, Eastern Ontario, Christian Labour Association of Canada
That's a very good question. I would point to the example of the City of Hamilton.
Before the City of Hamilton, in 2005, became signatory to the carpenters union, many of our signatory contractors and our members performed work in the city of Hamilton. The City of Hamilton, prior to 2005, had a fair wage policy. Our contractors abided by that and our members were paid under that policy. You're very correct in pointing out that this is not necessarily a wage or compensation issue. Speaking to the economic side of the issue, it's a lack of competition that creates those cost overruns. When you shrink the pool of bidders by over 90%, you lose the ability to possibly get a lower number on who can do a particular job. That's the economic side of it.
The fairness side of the issue, from our perspective, is that our members have freely chosen to join our union and work for contractors who are signatory to our union. By doing so, they find themselves on the outside looking in in places like Hamilton, Toronto, and Waterloo, because they are not able to work on certain projects because their contractor is not able to bid on them.
4:55 p.m.
Conservative