Rodger Cuzner

[Business of Supply, May 31st, 2012]

Madam Speaker, the minister appeared yesterday before the human resources committee, and it was a veritable love-in.

I acknowledged, and I am convinced, that two of the initiatives in the recent changes are of benefit to unemployed workers. They are the best weeks provision and the working while on claim provision. Both of those provisions are positive initiatives.

In return, the other half of that love-in was that the minister acknowledged the fact that they were both Liberal pilot projects. However, the Conservatives enhanced the working while on claim provision. I want to be truthful with that particular claim.

What I want to ask is about consultation. As convinced as I am about those two provisions, the other regulations are going to help with the out-migration of communities in Atlantic Canada. Was there any consultation? We know Brad Wall had talked to the Prime Minister. Has the minister spoken with Brad Wall? Is that where the consultation was? He seems to be the only guy that--

[Business of Supply, May 31st, 2012]

Madam Speaker, I first have a a point of clarification. My colleague from the NDP had noted a cautionary gesture about how this will devastate Atlantic Canada, and it will have a huge impact on Atlantic Canada. Over 50% of the regional GDP is based around seasonal industries. Moreover, 39% of seasonal workers in this country are in the province of Quebec, so it would have a huge impact on the province of Quebec.

I like my colleague's comments because the questions coming from the government today factor around somebody who would take a cut in income because of the reduction in the new rules. What they fail to understand is that in a lot of these rural communities where people work in one or two different seasonal jobs, they do not have access to public transportation or child care. The single parents trying to knit together an annual income and support two industries, for example, do not have access to these supports. A lot of the time it is just a math equation telling them that they cannot afford to take lesser dollars working at a particular job.

I would like the member's comments on that particular issue.

[Restoring Rail Service Act, May 29th, 2012]

Then what happened was the Liberal government balanced the books and recorded surpluses, and these guys came in and blew it all. That is what happened, only after they added $100 billion to the national debt.

My colleague from Vancouver East talked about this being the 25th time these guys have used closure with their legislation. I want to share another statistic. In the last 62 years, back-to-work legislation has been used 37 times. In the last 62 years, back-to-work legislation has come to the chamber 37 times. These guys have brought it forward five times in the last year. I am not sure what the prize is for that, but they should be hanging their heads. They will get their prize from organized labour when the next election comes.

The government's record has been one of intervention and favouritism. Instead of being neutral and fair, the government has been just the opposite. It prepares back-to-work legislation even before a strike is due or a lockout occurs. It appoints inappropriate arbitrators and enacts back-to-work legislation that imposes even worse conditions than the parties themselves had agreed to. We saw that with the Canada Post situation. It came forward with legislation that offered a lower wage increase than Canada Post had already agreed upon. It is amazing.

It uses the Canada Industrial Relations Board as a pawn. It throws everything into the Canada Industrial Relations Board. We have seen the government's interference and interventionist actions in labour relations in the past. It has done nothing but poison the well of relations between companies and employees instead of cooling parties off. It is like consecutive episodes of Hell's Kitchen. With every preparation, it has one temperature over there for cooking, and that is burn and scorch. That is what it has done to relations between management and organized labour in this country. It has scorched relations.

George Smith is former director of labour relations at Air Canada and vice-president of human resources at CP Rail. He has been on the other side of the table, on the management side. He stated:

This has all the appearances of the federal government doing what’s best for the country but really it’s a disaster... If you are negotiating a difficult labour contract, the process is being taken out of your hands and the government will do it for you. The “showdown” element which hurts in the short run but results in a fair settlement is gone.

We would not dare believe that the government would listen to experts. It has not shown any kind of respect at all for the Parliamentary Budget Officer or any of those people. The minister does not even listen to her own officials. I asked her about that in an earlier exchange. On the legislation on the first Air Canada lockout, her officials advised against it. The officials stated:

This is an option to be used only in very extreme circumstances where there is a serious impact on the national economy – in this instance it would appear to be more of an inconvenience to travellers who would have to rely on other modes of transportation.

I questioned the minister about the advice she was getting from her senior officials this time around. Since she ignored the advice in the past, I asked if she was getting similar advice this time and ignoring it as well. Is this a crisis? The Conservatives have been in government six and a half years and had a crisis in the skills gap, a crisis in the fishery, a crisis in the environment. They should have a department of crises because they seem to manufacture crises. That is one thing they are good at: manufacturing crises.

Let us look back at the Canada Post dispute. The government legislated a lower wage rate. It forced an arbitrator to look at the financial considerations of the company and not the workers. That is another example of legislation undertaken by the government which benefits management and corporations as opposed to workers.

The minister was taken to the woodshed over the back-to-work legislation with Canada Post. She received a scathing rebuke from Federal Court Justice Martineau, who ripped the minister for her involvement. The minister wasted no time in sticking her nose into the collective bargaining process in the cases of Canada Post and Air Canada and used the threat of back-to-work legislation that hurt the process. Everyone knew that this would be the case this time as well, and therein lies the problem. The union and the company both knew the minister would not miss an occasion to try to grab the spotlight and introduce back-to-work legislation immediately.

The tabling of the legislation was one thing but the signalling of the tabling of the legislation last week is another. I am sure that the execs at CP were out golfing this past weekend because they knew what was going to happen. They knew what was inevitable this week so they probably had the weekend off. They probably managed to get in 18 or 36 holes.

When this happens it becomes a problem because the government becomes the centre of the dispute and both parties stop negotiating. It is bad for the union, it is bad for the company, it is bad for government and it is bad for the country. Yet this is a new labour relations model for the government. It is one that every expert on both sides of the issue believes is wrong.

I am going to quote George Smith again because ironically, as a former labour relations director for both Air Canada and CP, his opinion should mean something to the government. He has been unique in his perspective on how the government has dealt with both of these disputes. He said repeatedly that the government is worsening employee relations at federal employers by its constant interventions. He wisely said, “You can't legislate peace” and that the government's intervention brings long-term instability and distrust between the employees and employers that are ultimately unpredictable and unproductive.

The mess the government has created in one year of labour relations will take years to undo.

Canadians are reasonable and fair people. We can start to see that Canadians are losing trust in the government. From the F-35 fiasco to the robocall scandal, Canadians are seeing the true colours of the government. The majority reform government is taking off the sheep's clothing. I have a feeling however there are still a few progressive Conservative MPs who are feeling quite uneasy about how the government is abusing its power, whether it is against the poor and vulnerable in our society, against seniors or against the enshrined rights afforded to workers.

With the way the government has treated workers over the last year and the incompetence it has shown in handling labour relations at Canada Post and CP Rail, I cannot with good conscience support the government's legislation. Back-to-work legislation should never be seen as a success. If it represents anything, it represents failure. The action of the government has time and time again been a failure.

If the government even dreams that it is legislating peace and harmony at CP, it had better wake up and apologize to organized labour in our country.

We have seen the results. We have seen two charter challenges. We have seen two court cases. Time after time, the government has made a mess of labour relations.

We will stand with the union on this particular bill. We will stand shoulder to shoulder with the teamsters on the bill and we will vote against this back-to-work legislation.

[Restoring Rail Service Act, May 29th, 2012]

Thank you very much, Madam Chair. I appreciate your intervention.

Professor Doorey weighed in on this highly interventionist federal legislation restricting collective bargaining and the right to strike and lockout in this country. Really, he directed his comments more so at the minister:

[The minister] always tells the media that the government wants a voluntary deal reached by all parties themselves. However, most everyone who knows anything about collective bargaining argues that she is in fact discouraging this from happening by promising employers that the government will step in with back to work legislation designed to prioritize the employers' interests.

We have seen that time and time again.

There has been reference made through the course of the debate here today on legislation that a Liberal government put forward in 1995. I would like to set the record straight on this because several Conservatives have made that point here today and, certainly, the circumstances were completely different. In that case, not just CP but CN and VIA Rail were all involved in various stages of work stoppages.

Rolling strikes had started at CP on March 8, CP locked out employees on March 13, CN employees went on strike on March 18, and VIA got pulled in there, making any kind of rail traffic in this country grind to a halt. Rail service ceased to exist in this country.

So, the minister at the time, Lucienne Robillard, did not tip her hand prior to that. She put together back-to-work legislation, for March 21. The Liberals were in a majority government, but she brought that legislation to the Reform Party--the Bloc was the official opposition at the time--and the Reform Party supported it.

The NDP, at the time, only had nine members in the House. It was not an official party. However, she went to the NDP. Bill Blaikie, who is a respected parliamentarian, I think we can agree on that, came forward with amendments and put forward two reasoned amendments that Madam Robillard agreed to.

Now, that was a majority government that knew that in this place, in order to be successful and in order to serve Canadians, there was an opportunity if parties worked together. Again, this is foreign to the current government.

Bill Blaikie and the NDP supported this back-to-work legislation. Negotiations had gone on late Wednesday. Let me just read a couple of quotes. “Blaikie won from Robillard two concessions” and would end all strikes, not just the CN strike, and “the arbitrators appointed to settle all the issues at nine different bargaining tables would be chosen from the judiciary”.

So, there were two reasoned amendments that Mr. Blaikie put forward and they were accepted.

Mr. Blaikie also recognized that the country-wide dispute certainly had an impact on the economy at that time, and he offered his support, so we saw all-party support on the back-to-work legislation, with the exception of the Bloc.

[Restoring Rail Service Act, May 29th, 2012]

Madam Chair, if there is one thing Canadians can recognize, it is the emergence of a bit of an overall demeanour, a policy development demeanour on the part of the Conservative government. When I say policy development demeanour, I mean when it develops policy its belief is “da meaner, the better”.

In this case, in dealing with organized labour in this country, we have seen that approach, the meaner, the better. When it comes to collective bargaining in this country, our party believes in fair and honest collective bargaining, something I have seen over the course of this debate that separates us from the Conservative Party. What we have seen is no example whatsoever of any kind of belief.

The Conservatives like to talk the talk, but the walk is not there. The actions they have undertaken certainly show no respect for collective bargaining. Canadians do not have to take our word for it; there are enough experts in this country.

I would like to quote David Doorey, from York University's School of Human Resource Management, a lecturer at London School of Economics, speaker at Osgoode Hall—

[Restoring Rail Service Act, May 29th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, one thing I have picked up from the questions being posed by the Conservatives throughout the evening is that they are not sensing that in each piece of back-to-work legislation that the minister has brought forward, including this case, even before the legislation is tabled, she tips her hand well in advance. She told the parties that she was going to introduce back-to-work legislation.

I am sure the executives at CP Rail spent the weekend on the golf course. As they knew that the legislation was coming, they did not have to focus on any negotiations so they could get 18 or 36 holes in. It was a great weekend. Why not? These are the actions we have seen time and again from the minister. Would the member like to comment on that?

[Restoring Rail Service Act, May 29th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, as we look back at what has taken place with the back-to-work legislation put forward by the government over the last number of months, it is like several bad episodes of Hell's Kitchen, where preparations may be ongoing, but when it comes time, the government has one temperature over there and it is on fry. What it has done is just toasted the relationship between workers and the company. We have seen that with Air Canada, Canada Post and we see it again here.

What is at risk is that for other corporations and federally-regulated industries, this will become common practice, that they will rag the puck. They will come down to a decision time and know that the minister will be coming in with back-to-work legislation. I would like my colleague's comments on that.

[Restoring Rail Service Act, May 29th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, I am trying to compose myself. I hear the Conservatives talking about how they are fighting for jobs. I am sure the 19,000 federal civil servants who are receiving separation slips over the next couple of months will be inspired by the comments coming from the government tonight.

One thing that recent history has shown us is that back-to-work legislation in no way guarantees peace and harmony within the labour sector. We have seen two charter challenges arise from past actions of this government. We have seen two court battles arise as a result of back-to-work legislation from the government.

I ask my friend from the NDP this question: does he think that this will go anywhere at all towards making the CP Rail work atmosphere and work environment any more peaceful and productive?

[Restoring Rail Service Act, May 29th, 2012]

Madam Speaker, one thing we all know is that back-to-work legislation really indicates failure, not success.

One thing that has been well publicized in past pieces of legislation that have been tabled by the minister is that they were tabled contrary to advice received by senior department officials, and we know the past legislation tabled has resulted in two charter challenges and two extended court battles.

I ask the minister if in this case there was any such representation from her senior officials. If so, what ramifications of this legislation do we anticipate down the road?

[Continuation and Resumption of Rail Service Operations Legislation, May 29th, 2012]

Mr. Speaker, we have heard from the other side with regard to the legislation that has been presented in this particular case. As we know, this is the fifth time that we have seen back-to-work legislation come from the government. Certainly in past cases, when we look at Canada Post, we saw legislation that came forward that was very restrictive and prescriptive. It really tied an arbitrator's hands. It really tilted the scales toward the company in that particular case. The Air Canada back-to-work legislation was a very similar case.

The minister is trying to shine her halo here by saying that this is a less egregious piece of legislation because the Conservatives have left a lot to the arbitrator. What the Conservatives fail to understand is that it is the actions of the past that have really set the dial. Last week she triggered the fact that she would be coming with back-to-work legislation. That tilted the whole issue toward the company and put the workers at a disadvantage.

I would like my colleague's comments on that.