Mr. Speaker, I rise to participate in the debate on this private members' bill brought forward by the Bloc Quebecois member for Laurentides.
This bill seeks to ban the so-called orphan clauses or grandfather clauses from being included in collective agreements bargained for under the jurisdiction of the Canada Labour Code, the Parliamentary Employment and Staff Relations Act and the federal Public Service Staff Relations Act.
These clauses allow older workers or senior workers and long time employees to keep their acquired rights and privileges such as hours or pay rates. These clauses are needed whenever a new collective agreement is reached which changes the previous conditions of employment.
The problem that is created with this is that new and mostly young workers begin a job that, for example, pays less in the new agreement than it did in the old. It could be that an employee who has been with a company for 10 years is making more money than a new employee doing the same job. This would happen if a 10 year veteran had his or her pay rate from a previous collective agreement protected in a subsequent collective agreement that applies to a new employee coming on to the job after that new agreement takes effect.
This is the problem that the hon. member is trying to address. At face value it seems a noble pursuit. She is fighting a seemingly discriminatory two-tiered wage scheme. If the workers who are generally young people start at lower rates, it can take longer for them to catch up. I believe that these things should be worked out at the bargaining table during collective agreement negotiations between the employer and the employees.
For the benefit of those who are listening, Reform Party policy on employment and labour management relations states:
A. The Reform Party supports the right of workers to organize democratically, to bargain collectively, and to strike peacefully.
B. The Reform Party supports the harmonization of labour-management relations, and rejects the view that labour and management must constitute warring camps.
C. The Reform Party supports the right of all Canadians, particularly the young, to enter the work force and achieve their potential. Unions and professional bodies may ensure standards but should not block qualified people from working or from gaining the necessary qualifications.
Among other things regarding labour relations and collective bargaining, this is what the grassroots members of our party have written as our policy.
I commend the hon. member for bringing Bill C-212 before the House. She has no doubt done a great deal of work on her bill. I asked her office to provide me with further information, further to the bill itself, for my information, knowledge and use in preparing to speak today. But the member refused. She told her assistant to tell my assistant that she would not provide me with explanatory notes or any other information related to the bill. This was most peculiar. Why the secrecy?
At any rate, I did my own research on this bill. I have spoken with Labour Canada and the Professional Institute of the Public Service of Canada. I contacted the Action démocratique Québec in the Quebec legislature and I have done research including a search of the media to find out what other people are saying about this issue and this bill.
This bill is similar to Bill 67 introduced by the Quebec separatist government.
This explains why the hon. member is bringing this matter before the House. She wants the federal government to apply the same laws that the Quebec separatists are going to apply in their province.
The separatist government in Quebec tried to pass this legislation before the last Quebec provincial election but it failed. It is trying to pass it again and it is having problems again.
Consultations were held throughout Quebec. Employers were accused of not treating young people fairly and unions were accused of bargaining for less favourable working conditions for young people.
A report prepared by the Quebec labour department and tabled by the Quebec labour minister in the Quebec legislature says that if Quebec passes the law it will cost thousands of jobs. I might add that the Quebec media reported that the labour minister tabled the report without even knowing if it concluded that these jobs would be lost. Not only does this uncover the incompetence of the separatist minister, but it also points to the difficulties of accomplishing what this bill is trying to do.
It is no wonder that one is hard pressed to find any other jurisdiction that has this legislation. This legislation is not found anywhere because it is not needed. Even if we give the hon. member the benefit of the doubt and try to justify the federal government becoming involved in the collective bargaining process, we find that we would place the government in the position of micro-managing things. These kinds of policies lead to a crippled, ineffective government.
We are trying to remedy a phenomenon that took place in the 1980s. The recession caused two tier wage schemes to be adopted as a means of fighting the economic recession and saved jobs from being lost. These two tiered systems were not resorted to everywhere, and where they were, we hope they will be negotiated away by the arrival of the new millennium.
The stagnant Quebec economy, almost entirely ruined and soon to be entirely ruined by the minority separatist movement, appears to be continuing to suffer from the two tier wage scheme. This is to be lamented. Jobs in Quebec are indeed extremely valuable.
The separatists should learn from this debate. They should learn that in their economy there have been unique problems because of the political separatist movement. Their economy cannot grow because investors do not want to risk their money in a place that could plunge into turmoil and chaos at any time.
Problems that are at least 20 years old continue to persist as the separatist political leaders stubbornly continue on their mission at the expense of workers and young Quebecers. It is sad, but true.