Mr. Speaker, I am doing just that and I hope my hon. colleagues in the government will keep their conduct in this place elevated. That is not what I see. It is not what I see in this bill and not what I see in the way they dismiss debate in this House. They know that what is introduced by a minister representing the bureaucrats in his departments is going to be passed regardless of what is said in this place, regardless of what they say, regardless of whether they sit in this place and debate bills on second reading or in clause by clause or in committee.
They know that in so far as democratic deliberation is concerned, this place has been turned into a joke by this and previous governments. I know that many of the members opposite, honourable members, confident people and people of integrity, sat in this place and debated bills like Bill C-19 when the previous Progressive Conservative government sat in a majority on the government side. They tried to debate things while in opposition and said the same things I am now as an opposition member, that the bureaucrats run the departments, they run the minister when it comes to Bill C-19, and the minister runs the backbench majority of this House.
Democracy is not working and it is not working in Bill C-19. Labour department bureaucrats have written a bill that overrides the fundamental principles of liberal democracy on which this country relies. They say that a hand picked group of patronage hacks who sit on the Canadian Industrial Relations Board, people of real integrity and principle like Ted Weatherill, will be able to determine whether workers are forced into a union against the will of as many as 70% of the members. That is what Bill C-19 at page 14 states.
It says the board may order a representational vote on union certification to satisfy itself that the workers want the union. They do not have to. They can certify the union themselves.
Who? Not the workers. Who? Not the members of parliament. Not democratically elected representatives, but hand picked, unaccountable, unelected, patronage appointees of the government. They have more power in this bill than do ordinary working Canadians. That is a disgrace.
I do not know how the members opposite—what members there are opposite—can support a bill that undermines the principle of democracy. All we are saying through Motion No. 7, through our effort to amend this section of the act is that yes, workers have the right to collectively bargain. Yes, they have the right to gather together and to enforce their rights and to negotiate their rights as a collective bargaining unit. Never should a union be imposed on individuals at a workplace unless they invite it upon themselves. That is called democracy.
Right here, what we are seeking to do through Motion No. 7 moved by my hon. colleague from Wetaskiwin is:
That Bill C-19, in Clause 13, be amended by replacing lines 22 to 24 on page 14 with the following:
“13. Subsections 29(1) and (2) of the act are replaced by the following:
29.(1) The Board shall, for the purpose of satisfying itself as to whether employees in a unit wish to have a particular trade union represent them as their bargaining agent, order that a representation vote be taken among the employees in the unit where it is satisfied that at least thirty-five per cent of the employees in the unit are members of the trade unit applying for certification.
It is simple and it speaks for itself. I cannot understand why the government members opposite would not support it.
I look at the testimony that was brought before the human resources committee on this legislation. People like Mr. Clem Paul, president of the North Slave Metis Alliance said on this matter “The Metis do not want unionism forced on them because of the collective wishes of other groups in the workplace”. The Metis want to be free to join a union or not, according to the wishes of the individual. Imagine, freedom. Mr. Paul understands that but the labour minister, his bureaucrats and the backbenchers do not.
Mr. Paul went on to say “The choice of whether membership in a union benefits the worker should be the decision of each person who is free to make it for themselves. Restrictions on our freedom to benefit from opportunities coming available for the first time will harm us”. He is speaking of the Metis people becoming full partners in any groups of Canadian society. This is somebody whose people are struggling to get a leg up economically and they see the danger implicit in this bill.
Mr. John Keenan is vice-president of human resources at Falconbridge Limited, a major national mining company that has created thousands of good paying jobs in our economy. On this section of Bill C-19 he said that “unionized labour is a reality of working life. As long as there are equitable checks and balances in our system, the labour relations system, we can work in a harmonious fashion with our union colleagues”.
He went on to say “As it is now proposed, this section of the code will polarize labour-management relations and bring us back into the dark days of the 1950s and 1960s when labour relations were at a very low ebb in this country. We made a lot of progress and it is not appropriate to turn back the clock”. He also said that his company was not consulted on this bill.
Mr. Jim Utley is vice-president of human resources at Cominco, another major employer. He said on this section that “a secret ballot for all certification decisions would address these issues and ensure that employees are given an opportunity to express their views privately and without either the union or the employer looking over their shoulders”.
What is the problem with guaranteeing a right to a secret ballot, he asked, and so do I. He goes on to say “The process is the cornerstone of our democratic society, yet the proposed legislation expounds circumstances where this fundamental right is denied employees”.
The witnesses went on and on and on at the labour committee, at the human resources committee saying that this is an attack on democracy.
I ask my colleagues opposite why they do not accept the principle we are proposing in Motion No. 7. It is the principle of democracy, the principle that nobody should be coerced by the power of the state to give up some of their freedoms, to give up forced union dues unless they give their consent.
The principle that started small l liberal democracy was the principle of no taxation without representation, that people cannot be coerced by the power of the state to surrender the fruits of their labours, or to surrender some of their individual liberties unless they concur in that process.
Bill C-19 by refusing to require a secret ballot vote for certification with the support of the majority of members would do just that. It would force up to 70% of the people at a workplace into a union even though they expressed their clear and heartfelt objection.
This has happened. It happened under the rabid labour legislation introduced by the socialist parties, in Ontario under Bob Rae and in British Columbia under that maven of economic growth policy, that real democrat Glen Clark. Those two provinces had the same kind of provision where the provincial labour boards could certify a union even against the express wishes of the majority of the workers.
What has happened? In Windsor, Ontario the Wal-Mart employees voted 151 to 43 against union certification. But the Ontario Labour Relations Board hacks, appointed, unaccountable, unelected appointees, using Bob Rae's labour code said “Sorry. We do not like the outcome of this vote. We are going to force the 151 to accept what the 43 wanted”. That is not democracy. Neither was it democracy in B.C. when the workers at the Wal-Mart store in Nelson voted overwhelmingly against union certification and the B.C. relations board overturned that.
In closing I encourage hon. members opposite to stand up for the democracy they represent by having been elected to this place and let workers exercise it through a secret ballot in the workplace.