Madam Speaker, first I want to congratulate my colleague from Terrebonne—Blainville for the excellent work she has done on this bill. The work put into drafting this bill and seeing it through required good analysis of the subject matter, judicious consultations, determination, a lot of energy and resources, but mostly a lot of heart. When a bill has all these ingredients, it is a good bill and can only be successful. The hon. member's presentation was also very judicious and very enlightening. I thank my colleague for all those reasons.
Psychological harassment is a difficult subject that we have been talking about for far too long. It is not unlike sexual harassment. We talked about that for a very long time before creating legislation to put an end to it, and it worked. The same will be true for psychological harassment. It is a concern in our society.
The Government of Quebec introduced a bill on this exactly one year ago. This bill became law. I will talk about it later. Psychological harassment does not necessarily need to be punished. It needs to be banished and eliminated. That is the direction any bill should take. Any bill on this issue should have a more convincing effect than a simple policy or the goodwill of managers or other colleagues. There absolutely needs to be legislation.
Marie-France Hirigoyen, psychoanalyst and psychiatrist, defined psychological harassment very well. I will read her definition:
Moral harassment at work is defined as any abusive conduct (action, word, behaviour, attitude, etc.) that adversely affects, through its repetition or systematization, the psychic or physical dignity or integrity of a person, compromising that person's employment or the work environment.
Bill C-360 really meets the objective to prevent psychological harassment, under this definition. This bill seeks to prevent psychological harassment, as I said earlier. It is applicable not only to the entire public service, but also to all employees subject to the Canada Labour Code, such as radio and television, bank, grain company, port and airport employees.
This has created two categories of workers in Quebec, which has excellent legislation, as we know, to prevent psychological harassment. This legislation came into force exactly one year ago June 1. A symposium is being held on June 10 to evaluate the results. However, some results are already clear.
In short, there are two categories of workers in Quebec. There are those, approximately 3 million in total, who are subject to the Canada Labour Code. They are entitled, for example, to a precautionary cessation of work. They benefit from anti-scab legislation and also legislation against psychological harassment. Furthermore, 10% of workers—8% of whom come under the Canada Labour Code—are not covered by such protections.
Two sisters or brothers living under the same roof might have very different working conditions. People whose jobs fall under the Canada Labour Code are at a clear disadvantage. In Quebec, there must no longer be two categories of workers.
We in the Bloc Québécois have a good solution for this. That solution is sovereignty. We will get back to that later.
Until Quebec achieves sovereignty, the Canada Labour Code must contain the same provisions as the Quebec code. One of the ways this uniformity can be achieved would be to pass this bill on psychological harassment.
The Quebec legislation came into effect on June 1, 2004. It is an innovative piece of legislation, a first in North America. Everyone agrees on that. Its first performance report has just been released. At the time it came out, that is May 28, there had been close to 2,300 complaints of psychological harassment, 2,266 to be exact. Most of these were justified, and very few were frivolous. Today, 45% of them have been settled, and the complainants have been able to enjoy a healthier working environment. It is important to point that out, because it is the reason for having a bill such as this.
Obviously, this means 27% of complainants did not proceed. When there is a new bill in place, some people do not really understand how it works.
Do they fit within the definition of psychological harassment? Indeed, 27% of files ended up not proceeding, and that is fine.
As I said earlier, a symposium will be held on June 10 and the legislation will be examined there. It will also be a good time to discuss it here.
I would mention in passing that two thirds of the SMEs in Quebec with 50 employees or more have adopted measures to prevent psychological harassment. While it was feared that more and more labour disputes would involve legal action, the effect has been the opposite, one of promoting improved labour relations.
In January, labour ministers from the provinces, including Quebec, met in Toronto. They discussed problems of health, safety, workplace well-being, work-life balance and psychological harassment. They recognized the uniqueness and merit of the Quebec legislation. They met unions, management and people from government. They looked at Quebec legislation. The minister from Ontario stated there was clearly a close link between occupational health and safety and the success of a business, because physically and mentally healthy individuals working in safe surroundings increase the productivity of companies and keep them competitive.
I will conclude on this point. It was mentioned earlier that the Arthurs commission was studying part 3 of the Canada Labour Code. However, we can chew gum and walk at the same time. We can examine this bill in committee and let Harry Arthurs do his work.