Industry committee  Yes. I'm sorry. Can you repeat it?

Industry committee  Thank you for the question. My apologies for making you repeat it. I think that any time we go into voluntary we get into trouble, just as a fundamental approach to the work, so we do have major concerns there. I would like to pass it on to my colleague, Chris, to flesh out ou

Industry committee  Good afternoon, committee members. It is my honour to be here with you today. The 55 national and international unions affiliated with the Canadian Labour Congress bring together three million workers in virtually all sectors, industries, occupations and regions of the country.

Information & Ethics committee  No. We came today with what we have provided.

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, absolutely. We know that the chilling effect can happen. It can happen not just to folks who are worried. Sometimes it's because they don't know the rules, and then someone told them that this could happen, so it's just easier not to participate. That's a real danger. For u

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, being a volunteer on campaigns means a lot of different things to a lot of different people. Sometimes it's part of journey in terms of the type of work that they're going to go into. Sometimes it's maybe just about learning more skills and making more connections in their c

Information & Ethics committee  The one size fits all doesn't work here. It absolutely could be a sliding scale. It doesn't need to be done individual by individual. It could be done category by category. Everybody has that kind of access, the time they served, etc. That would make it more fair for people who a

Information & Ethics committee  I believe this being known is really important, but we have to be very worried about people getting caught up in this and not being allowed to participate. If the standards are there and people have to follow them, every time someone says something happened and someone got caugh

Information & Ethics committee  Harmonizing does make sense, but what you're not dealing with is the onus of reporting and keeping an eye on it and the administration attached to it. We had 400 activists in Ottawa last week, and we're really proud that they got to talk to their elected officials. The idea that

Information & Ethics committee  Yes, I think you're absolutely right. We agree that getting big money out of politics makes a lot of sense. That's why it's individually funded. That subsidy would help to do that. What that subsidy would not do is negate the need for volunteers. Elections would still need volun

Information & Ethics committee  I don't believe the Constitution should be worked around. I do think it covers everybody. Yes, I'm here talking and giving you personal stories about what it would mean to me, but I'm not alone in that. There are lots of people who hold office in the labour movement and also wan

Information & Ethics committee  It's as we've put in front of you. I would also argue about phrases like “frequent and extensive”—and one of the witnesses has said exactly how they interpret that. If our political activity is “frequent and extensive”, what does that mean? Does that mean I did it twice in one we

Information & Ethics committee  Not at this time. I can leave it to Mr. Thurlow.

Information & Ethics committee  I agree with you that participation is extremely important. You're right that we see this cooling off happening, where people aren't participating because maybe they don't think they have influence on politics. It's something we take quite seriously when we talk to our members, b

Information & Ethics committee  No, a two-year period is better. Our big concern is that lower threshold, which is really encompassing almost any kind of participation in that kind of election process as a volunteer. That is more the concern, which has that 12-month cooling off period. In terms of going forwar