Mr. Speaker, I am being heckled by members across the way which is a standard operating procedure in the House.
Farmers are very cognizant of these serious ramifications and Canadians are very aware that when these stoppages occur our international reputation is greatly damaged. We all want to protect against this.
There have been several occasions where back to work legislation appeared to be the only alternative to end a dispute and provide relief to those losing thousands, even millions, of dollars due to work stoppage. It is not the only alternative available.
It is not Reform's policy to simply criticize a policy but to proactively come up with concrete alternatives and legislation that will provide substantive change. In the case of labour disputes, we are confident that final offer selection arbitration is the best hope for getting a settlement. It requires both sides to act in good faith and lessens some of the bitter aftermath of a strike or a lockout.
I hope the government members in the House take the time to listen while I elaborate on this process. It is an excellent alternative to back to work legislation that they will find attractive.
Back to work legislation undermines the collective bargaining process. Final offer selection arbitration kicks in only after a union and an employer cannot come to an agreement. Together they must agree on and recommend an arbitrator or arbitration panel. The union and the employer must give the arbitrator a list of the issues they cannot agree on and a list of the issues they have agreed on. For the disputed issues the arbitrator receives from each party a final offer for settlement. The arbitrator will then select one of the final offers. His offer is binding on both parties.
What this means is that both sides will be forced to make reasonable offers. Each will want the arbitrator to pick their offer or they will be forced to live with the offer made by the other party. Therefore to provide a better chance that the arbitrator accepts their offer, I believe that both the union and the employer will make a good attempt at being more than reasonable.
This concept is simple and it avoids prolonged work stoppages or back to work legislation. The entire nature of the collective bargaining process can be improved in the long term. Unions and employers will become more aware of the reality of final offer selection arbitration and will be more inclined to habitually negotiate in good faith. As a result unions and employers will become more focused on negotiations instead of the political ploys and media stunts that are seen frequently in current labour disputes where back to work legislation looms on the horizon.
I would like to digress at this point and explain to viewers back home in a simpler way and use an analogy. In business there is a common practice for partners who are in business together. I am sure you are well aware of this, Mr. Speaker. You have been in business for a number of years in different enterprises over your working life in the real world. I am certain you can appreciate what I am going to talk about.
The reality is that when people enter into a partnership sometimes they are concerned about what may happen in the future. They enter into what is commonly referred to as a shotgun agreement. How does a shotgun agreement work? If you come to an impasse where one of the partners wants to leave the partnership and wants to sell his side to the other partner or see the business sold, the agreement protects the partner who is still in the enterprise.
You have to make a reasonable offer. Under the terms of that agreement, if you put too high a value on your half of the company, let us say you have a 50:50 share in a corporation, the shotgun agreement allows the other partner to say “that is too high, you pay me that amount and instead of me buying you out at x dollars, you buy me out”. This is similar in a way to final offer selection arbitration. It forces both sides in a potential dispute to be reasonable. It forces them to come up with a reasonable offer, because there is a certain amount of fear that if they do not have the most reasonable offer the other side's offer will be accepted.
I use that because a lot of farmers I am pleased to represent are well aware of shotgun agreements and how they work. It might better help them to understand what we are talking about when we talk about final offer selection arbitration and how that could force both sides to be more reasonable and force them to the middle ground.
The federal government has jurisdiction over approximately 10% of the labour force. Federal legislation and the Canadian Labour Code affect 700,000 employees. The federal government has an opportunity and an obligation, I suggest, to set an example in labour relations. The advantages and benefits that would arise from the use of final offer selection arbitration by the federal government have the potential to resonate through the entire Canadian labour force.
As I have said, there are a number of flaws contained in Bill C-19. I am primarily concerned with the substance it lacks in order that farmers can avoid the dire consequences of work stoppages. There are several aspects of this bill that are nothing short of alarming.
Section 109.1 gives the Canada Industrial Relations Board authority to order an employer to release names and addresses of off site workers to union recruiters. I can hardly believe this government would consider this kind of legislation in today's society where we are supposed to be knowledgeable about the risks to personal privacy and safety.
Under no circumstances should individual rights be compromised, particularly to initiate unsolicited contact from any organization or individual.
One of Reform's amendments to Bill C-19 put forward by my hon. colleague would have at least given employees the freedom to choose whether their names and addresses were released. This is a fundamental right and I am astonished that I am even debating this issue in this House. How can this government justify violating an individual's right to privacy? We should think about it.
There are many other options available to ensure that off site workers have access to union information and activities without going to this extreme. This is certainly not the way to go about it. There is no evidence of fairness and balance in a bill which jeopardizes personal rights, privacy and safety.
I want to get to one other issue also contained in the bill that I am very concerned about. Under this section the minister will not guarantee Canadian workers under federal jurisdiction the right to participate in secret ballot representation votes to determine whether a union will represent them. There is a section in this bill that will allow that. We should just think about this for a moment. They will not get a secret vote. This bill is actually an attack on democracy and I feel very strongly about this. It kind of reminds me of another bill.
As I said at the outset, Mr. Speaker, regarding your concern about relevance, I do not want to digress too much but it is very similar to a bill that was recently rammed through this House with the use of closure, Bill C-4, the amendments to the Canadian Wheat Board Act, which I referred to briefly in my remarks earlier this morning. Why does it remind me of that bill? Democracy delayed is democracy denied, and freedom delayed is freedom denied. That is what happened with Bill C-4.
With Bill C-4, this government and the Minister responsible for the Canadian Wheat Board had the opportunity to act and to grant farmers some freedom. What did we see? We saw them completely flout democracy and it has been denied.
I asked the minister if he intends to sit idly by and watch farmers be thrown in jail for protesting what they view as a fundamental issue of democracy and freedom, the right to sell their own product. Obviously with the passage of Bill C-4 he does.
Similarly, Bill C-19 gives the Canada Industrial Relations Board jurisdiction to certify a trade union that does not have a majority support “where, but for the unfair labour practice, the union could reasonably have been expected to have had the support of the majority of the employees in a unit”.
Imagine that. What we see here is an attack on democracy. No secret vote, and it will be left to this Canada Industrial Relations Board to make this arbitrary decision to certify a union despite the fact that it will not have any clear signal whether the majority of the workers in that workplace wish to be represented by that union. Think about this.
Neither the Canada Industrial Relations Board nor any other body has the capacity to rationally discharge a task which involves nothing more than wild speculation. If an employer has committed an unfair labour practice the board should sanction the employer, not deprive workers of their fundamental democratic right to vote on the wisdom of union representation. Certainly I am in agreement with that.
Mr. Speaker, I see you are indicating, unfortunately. It is amazing how quickly time goes when a person is concerned about this legislation and the attack on democracy built into Bill C-19.