Mr. Speaker, I rise today in support of the motion put forward by my hon. colleague from Sault Ste. Marie on precarious employment. I certainly enjoy working with him on industry committee. He brings a depth of experience to everything he does. I really thank him for bringing this forward for us to talk about in the House and hopefully take forward to committee.
The committee work that is done for the House of Commons by members of all parties and by the witnesses who come from across Canada to share their expertise is critical to us developing good policy in Canada. I really do not want to undersell the advantage that we have as members of Parliament to put our committees to good use, to give us the input we need to come up with good regulations and good laws.
As I begin, I would like to share the story of one of my constituents. Karen is a personal support worker in Guelph. Personal support workers care for the elderly, the disabled and sick persons in their homes by providing services such as bathing and dressing and even just being there for conversation. Karen can work up to 70 or 80 hours in a week. She works full-time hours but she is classified as part time. In her own words she, "takes care of sick people but doesn't have a sick day." Karen has no pension and her benefits are not guaranteed. She says, "Because my employer says I'm part time, I have to requalify for benefits every year, by working at least 1,500 hours.”
She told me that last year her friend, another precarious worker, found out she had cancer. She missed a lot of work because she was so sick, and then she lost her benefits.
Karen's story is not unusual. She is paid $15 an hour during her time with clients, but she is not paid for her travel time. She cannot afford a car so she often rides the bus 30 to 45 minutes between appointments. She has no guaranteed hours in a week and she has no job security. Karen is a precarious worker.
Precarious employment is non-standard work that lacks stability, security and control. It can be part-time or temporary and it is under-protected by regulation.
This emerging trend is the reason this motion has found its way to the floor of the House of Commons. This motion would direct the Standing Committee on Human Resources, Skills and Social Development and the Status of Persons with Disabilities to undertake a study on precarious employment.
The emergence of precarious workers is a result of a rapidly changing marketplace. The standard employment relationship, the term for permanent, full-time, secure employment with a single employer, is still the most common form of job. The proportions of standard employment relationships, though, are dropping. However, as Karen's story tells us, norms do not reflect everyone's reality.
The rise of precarious employment is concerning for a number of economic and political reasons. It reflects a growing inequality in Canada and it contributes to racial and gender divisions in our society. Most worker advocates talk about the economic unfairness of precarious employment and the problems it creates in the labour market and in communities.
Precarious employment is also a health and safety issue, as has been discussed in other speeches in the House today. The status of being a precarious worker leads to worsened health and safety outcomes.
Precarious workers earn less and are less likely to have benefits or may have fewer benefits than other workers. Women, immigrants and young workers are more likely to hold precarious jobs than other Canadians. This leads to unequal access to some of our health care services, such as medication or counselling services that are available to other Canadians.
The status of being a precarious worker leads to worsened health and safety outcomes overall. Repeated studies with different types of precarious workers have shown that they are also more likely to be injured, for example, hotel cleaners who work for a temp agency. Most will be women who are paid low wages and have little job security or control over their schedules. Their work will be physically demanding and if they are unwell they are reluctant to call in sick for fear of not being hired again.
That is not to disparage temp agencies. As a small business employer myself, I did not have an HR department to help screen candidates. I did not have an HR department to help do the pre-training required to meet the conditions of my employment. Using temp agencies gave me access to labour that I would not have had on my own, apart from calling friends and neighbours about who they knew might be available for work. Temp agencies do have their place.
We have to look at the impact on workers chronically going through short-term contracts, never getting to full employment, never getting benefits or the security they need, mentally and physically, to be able to fulfill their lives in Canada.
Some studies suggest that jobs that demand a lot of effort but provide workers with little control over their work and little support can damage workers' health via stress. Currently, little to no work has been done to determine how to reduce the ill effects of precarious work, in large part because precarious work is just becoming recognized as a health and safety hazard.
To confront a problem like precarious employment, we first need to know more details. This is where the motion by the member for Sault Ste. Marie can play a very meaningful role. By attaching a definition and identifying the indicators of precarious employment, we can understand the cause and effect, so that we can provide recommendations to reverse this trend in the labour market. We can also hear from Canadians with lived experience, who might otherwise not have a voice to come forward.
However, the motion goes further in part two. It stresses the need to identify the role that precarious employment plays in the economy, particularly within the federally regulated private sector, to understand the impact it has on the lives of individual Canadians, like our study at the industry committee on how we could get more diversity on boards so that we would have better representation of all Canadians in the governance of companies. This study would say how we could get all Canadians participating in the labour force.
That the nature of work and the employment relationship can affect workers' health is a new concept. It requires us to rethink what constitutes a hazard and how hazards can cause health consequences, including how they interact with non-work aspects of workers' lives. It also causes us to contemplate new ways of controlling these new types of hazards.
One sure-fire way to reduce the health effects of precarity is to create jobs that are more secure and to support workers more fully. This solution requires broad-scale social, political, and economic change. I would also argue that it has to be environmentally sustainable.
As my speech draws to a close, I encourage all my colleagues to support the motion before us today. The labour market is changing. We need to understand how and where gaps are forming as a result of these changes in the market.
The first step to solving a problem is recognizing there is one. Canada's labour markets are changing and government policy needs to change with them. This review would help provide insight into the current changing situation and recommendations on how to manage this emerging problem, which would allow for more detailed debate in the House.
I again thank my hon. colleague from Sault Ste. Marie for bringing this forward for debate and for all he does to serve his community and Canadians.