44th Parl. 1st Sess.
December 14, 2023 10:00AM
- Dec/14/23 3:38:53 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I thank my colleague from Manicouagan for her speech. Of course, I recognize that she and her political party have long supported legislation to prevent replacement workers. We in the NDP are very proud to have forced the Liberals to make that happen. It was an essential condition of the agreement we negotiated with them. Let us not forget that the Liberals have always voted against such bills in the past.
While there are things my colleague and I agree on, such as the benefits of this bill, there are Quebeckers who are currently suffering from the absence of such a bill. I am thinking of the dock workers at the Port of Quebec, as well the Videotron employees in western Quebec, in Gatineau, who are in a labour dispute.
Is my colleague prepared, before the law is enacted, to speak out against employers who use replacement workers, like the Port of Québec or Pierre Karl Péladeau?
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Madam Speaker, this legislation is long overdue. It has been called for by Canadian workers since before Canada was even a country. It would absolutely strengthen this economy and continue to grow our country, the greatest place to work, live and play. I can say that we did a lot of consulting. We consulted with workers, with labour representatives, with employers and with indigenous communities, who helped us craft this very important legislation. It is long overdue, and I would ask that member to support Bill C-58.
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- Dec/14/23 4:08:37 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, I cannot speak for members of the other parties, but we want to see this bill advance through all stages of the House.
I want to remind my hon. colleague that this is an issue the NDP has been fighting for for many years. We have the record to prove it: eight attempts with eight different bills and a united vote by both Liberals and Conservatives in 2016 to squash one of those legislative efforts.
I am not going to interfere with the right of my NDP colleagues who want to speak to this bill at second reading to demonstrate that history and the renewed commitment to workers in federally regulated places. We have their backs and are putting in legislative safeguards so that their collective bargaining rights will not be undermined by scab labour and big powerful corporations.
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Madam Speaker, I am pleased to stand today in support of Bill C-58.
On November 9, 2023, we tabled Bill C-58 to ban the use of replacement workers in federally regulated industries during a strike or a lockout. When the Minister of Labour argued his case, he clearly illustrated how resorting to strikebreakers does no good for anyone: not for employers, not for strikers and certainly not for Canadians. However, the minister reminded us that hiring replacement workers in 2023 is still legal.
We have seen many examples where a workplace that has been poisoned over the years, often including the use of replacement workers, experiences long and frequent work stoppages. Each side will argue its position, but ultimately, the use of replacement workers can undermine the rights of workers.
Addressing the use of replacement workers is long overdue. Unions have repeatedly told us that using replacement workers can poison relationships, prolong disputes and keep people from focusing on getting an agreement at the bargaining table. That is not good for either side and it is especially bad for the Canadian economy.
The Canadian labour movement has long been asking for this, and we have listened. The unions explained that allowing replacement workers undermines workers' rights to strike, and that gives employers the upper hand. They argued that this imbalance of power leads to more difficult bargaining processes and makes strikes and lockouts longer.
The government believes in free and fair collective bargaining because we know that is how the best deals are reached, deals that bring stability and certainty to our supply chains and services because they are built on agreements and compromises between the parties. Thorough collective bargaining and stability are not mutually exclusive, as some might argue. In fact, I believe that one reinforces the other.
That belief is at the core of the legislation we introduced on November 9. Bill C-58 proposes to ban new hires and contractors from doing the work of striking or locked-out employees. If it is a full strike where everyone is supposed to stop working, employers would not be able to use members of that bargaining unit and have them cross the picket line, even to work from home, for example.
We are going beyond a simple prohibition. We are proposing clear timelines to address issues with the maintenance of activities provisions in the Canada Labour Code. If and when the bill comes into force, the parties will have 15 days to come to an agreement on what services they need to maintain to protect the public from immediate and serious danger during a work stoppage.
If they cannot come to an agreement, the matter would have to be referred to the Canada Industrial Relations Board to resolve within 90 days. That is important because right now, if negotiating parties have to go to the board for this kind of decision, it can take months or even over a year. During that time, the right to strike or lockout is suspended while the parties present arguments in that forum.
It is also a distraction from the central issue, which is the collective agreement that they are meant to be negotiating. This bill is about keeping parties focused on the table so we can provide more stability and certainty for the economy.
I do not think it is overstating to say this would be the biggest thing to happen to collective bargaining in Canada in decades. We recognize that the ability to form a union, bargain collectively and strike is essential to a healthy workforce. Tensions can be extremely high during a work stoppage, and this only gets compounded by the use of replacement workers, which many people feel poisons the atmosphere, makes it hard for relationships to come back to normal and can prolong disputes.
We need employers and unions to come to the table ready to bargain and to get serious about getting things done. This legislation is pushing us in that direction. The lesson from history is that collective bargaining is successful when the parties recognize they have to sit down and negotiate fairly with each other.
The ban on the use of replacement workers would set the table for free and fair collective bargaining. The timelines for establishing maintenance of activities agreements would add structure to that portion of the bargaining process. It is amazing what happens when we allow room for unions and employers to come to a deal. That is where strong labour relations are forged, where the best deals are made and where we get stability for our economy.
As the Minister of Labour said, “Our economy depends on employers and workers negotiating an agreement at the table.” By tackling head-on the problem of poisoned workplaces and prolonged disputes, this legislation would bring more stability, more certainty and better collective agreements. We believe that stability and certainty in our supply chains and services are essential. This bill would deliver on that. It is good for unions, good for employers and good for Canadians.
Quebec has had a ban on replacement workers for going on close to five decades now. Successive governments have protected the legislation because they recognize its importance. In British Columbia, we have seen the same thing, and successive governments there have also maintained the legislation. It is important to point out that neither of those economies has collapsed. Businesses continue to open, operate and be profitable in those jurisdictions.
The legislation before us is not anti-employer, nor is it unreasonable. I know that unions are often seen as wanting to take away something from employers, but when workers are better off, we all benefit. Tackling problems is hard work, but when two parties sit down together to defend their interests, they find compromises and an agreement. Bill C-58 would encourage unions and employers to do exactly that.
Bea Bruske, who is the president of the Canadian Labour Congress, said, “The legislation will lead to less labour disruptions, fewer work stoppages and will help build a more balanced economy”. Lana Payne, who leads Unifor's nearly 70,000 members, said, “Finally, a government is taking important steps to uphold workers' fundamental right to [collective bargaining]”. She said that collective bargaining is something that would change lives, lift workers up and build equality and equity.
I would encourage all members to read the bill and to read what union leaders are saying, because what we have done here is so important to our economy. This is about the stability and the certainty that come with not being distracted by anything other than finding the solution at the table. That is where strong and lasting contracts are formed.
With clear and fair rules in place, we may be able to avoid unnecessary strikes and lockouts, which would create more stability for Canadians and more certainty for investors. That is what we would be doing with Bill C-58. It is a strong bill that reflects needed change in this country. It is how we build a successful economy and a successful country. The time to get this done is now. That is why I am asking each member to support Bill C-58.
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- Dec/14/23 4:30:44 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the workers who will be brought in to set up the battery plant are not scab labour. They are not replacement workers. The member needs to understand—
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- Dec/14/23 4:39:39 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, one of the fascinating things, since the member for Carleton took over, is the use of the Trojan horse approach. The Conservatives say they want to deal with all the stuff that is in the budget and keep us here until Christmas, but it was a way for them to be visibly on the record as voting against Ukraine. They managed to do that.
What they have been doing with this bill on anti-scab legislation is carrying on their constant attack on investment in EV technology. We see the Conservatives of the 401 corridor making fun of EV batteries, saying they are going to catch fire, that they are inefficient, that we should just give the money out, as though we give it out to everybody. Volkswagen is making a $7-billion investment in Canada. That is enormous. There will be $5 billion from Stellantis, and GM is going to spend $35 billion on EV technology. The Conservatives are claiming that the people who are brought over to help set up the plant are scab labour.
The Conservatives do not misunderstand the bill. They are abusing this bill to drive the agenda of the Conservative leader, the member who lives in Stornoway, who has undermined the EV investments that Canadians are dependent upon.
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Madam Speaker, it gives me great personal pleasure to stand in the House today to speak to Bill C-58, an act to amend the Canada Labour Code, which would finally ban the use of replacement workers or, as we in the labour movement call them, scabs, in federally regulated workplaces.
Prior to being elected in 2008, I had the honour of working for 16 years with the Teamsters union and, unlike many people in this place, I had the opportunity to experience, first-hand, how important this legislation is. I have been on and walked on many picket lines in my life, unlike most members in the House. I sat at bargaining tables, negotiating collective agreements.
I represented workers at labour board hearings and saw unfair labour practices, where employers would fire workers who did nothing more than exercise their rights under the Canada Labour Code and under the Charter of Rights. I have seen what happens when employers use replacement workers to undermine unions and workers as they are exercising their constitutional right to strike.
The NDP has been Canada's political party for workers for many decades. Prior to its formation as the New Democratic Party in 1960, it took the form of the Co-operative Commonwealth Federation. In all of its iterations, it has always been a party that puts at the centre of our being the need to make sure that workers in this country are protected.
We believe, as New Democrats, that Canadian workers deserve respect, dignity, generous wages, proper benefits, and safe and healthy working conditions. We know that workers are the backbone of the Canadian economy. We believe that all Canadian workers should get a fair share of the fruits of the wealth their labour, talents and skills play such a pivotal role in creating.
In this venue or milieu, no entity has done more to achieve these goals than Canada's labour movement. It is through the hard work of unions, their efforts, their courage and very often their sacrifices, that Canadian workers have come to enjoy the many benefits that they do today.
I want to touch on just a few of the benefits that were fought for by unions, benefits that Canadian workers take for granted today. In many cases, these were fought for by unions, demanded at bargaining tables and, in many cases, paid for by the blood, sweat and sacrifice of Canadian workers on picket lines. They include the 40-hour work week; overtime; paid vacations; pensions; health and welfare plans providing workers and their families with eyeglasses, dental services and prescriptions; paid sick time; a voice in the workplace; and, most importantly, the opportunity for workers to collectively bargain the terms and conditions of their work instead of simply taking whatever their employer is dictating to them.
These and many other rights were not given to workers. They are the products of hard-fought bargaining, often by workers who had to suffer great wage losses by striking or being locked out for these gains. They won these rights through collective bargaining and, incidentally, all workers, whether they are unionized or not in this country, now enjoy those benefits, paid for by those unions and the workers who sacrificed for them.
They never had to make these sacrifices without pain. These people did not do this only for themselves. They did it for other workers and for their children and generations to come. Many of these workers made these sacrifices at great risk to their personal safety. Canadian labour history is replete with horrific examples of employers hiring private security forces, often goons, to attack striking workers.
Some workers, many workers, even died. As they were laying down their tools and forgoing their wages to exercise their right to strike for the betterment of their fellow workers and for generations to come, many had to watch unscrupulous employers hire replacement workers, scabs, to cross those picket lines to perform their work.
What is the impact of that? When replacement workers are used, it undermines the workers. Workers lose money while they are striking, but employers continue to profit and operate during the strike, so that tilts the bargaining table in favour of management. It also prolongs strikes and lockouts. On average, labour disputes where scabs are used last six times longer than when they are not. It leads to picket line violence, divides communities and causes family tension and suffering.
I will go through a few examples in Canadian history. People may remember the Giant Mine strike, one of the most tragic events in Canadian labour history, which happened in Yellowknife. At that time, in 1992, Royal Oak Mines locked out its workers and decided to use replacement workers in that small community of Yellowknife. Canadian mines had not seen a replacement worker used in the previous 50 years. The scabs were used explicitly as strikebreakers. It undercut bargaining, enraged the local workers and split families in the community. The tragic result was that nine workers died in a bombing incident.
I personally experienced this kind of violence myself. The Gainers strike in Edmonton in 1986 was a strike that lasted six and a half months, and Peter Pocklington, the owner of Gainers, hired strikebreakers to break the strike of workers doing some of the hardest, most physical, unpleasant work there is working in a rendering plant. I watched as Peter Pocklington brought in scabs and saw first-hand the violence that caused on the picket line.
I remember the Zeidler Forest Products strike in the 1980s, where I saw scabs speed up as they were driving their cars toward the men and women on the picket lines, narrowly missing them and, in some cases, hitting them as they sped by, impervious to the striking workers' welfare. Lest we think this is a relic of the past, just this month I visited a picket line in Vancouver at Rogers Communications, which had locked out its workers in British Columbia and used scabs to cross the picket line to do the striking workers' jobs.
I also want to talk about the fact that the Liberals and Conservatives only seem to care about the rights of workers to strike in this country when the impact of those strikes is strong. They will order Canada Post workers back to work, and they will order port workers back to work, but right now, as we speak, there are hundreds of people on strike at the Sheraton Vancouver Airport Hotel. They are going into their third year on strike, and they are mainly women and immigrants. Maybe the impact of this strike is not as strong on the economy. In that case, the Liberals and Conservatives will let workers rot on the picket line for years, but if workers have any real economic clout, then, all of a sudden, their rights have less meaning.
The answer to this is to ban scabs. British Columbia has done it in this country for many decades, and so has Quebec. The NDP has introduced anti-scab legislation eight times in the last 15 years, and the Liberals and Conservatives voted against it every single time. Today, make no mistake, I want every Canadian worker in this country to know that Bill C-58 is the product of one party in the House, and that is the NDP. We forced the Liberals to put this in as a demand in our confidence and supply agreement. That agreement is not a mutual agreement. It is a series of 27 demands that the NDP made of the Liberals in exchange for our support of the government.
I have heard the Liberals bragging in the House about their 2021 platform. I looked at it, and in that platform, for the first time in history, the Liberals talked about banning replacement workers, but only in the case of a lockout. They did not care about banning replacement workers if workers exercised their right to strike. It was only in the narrow instance where an employer might lock out its workers that they were prepared to extend the ban of replacement workers. It was the NDP that said, no, we must ban replacement workers in all labour disputes, both in lockouts and strikes.
I want to thank organized labour, the CLC, the building trades and the Teamsters union. I also want to and give a shout-out to all my brothers and sisters in Teamsters Local 31 and Teamsters Canada across this country, who have been fighting for decades for this very basic and equitable measure in Canadian labour law.
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- Dec/14/23 4:52:45 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, there are reams of evidence, decades of evidence, showing that, when we ban replacement workers, we shorten labour disputes and we reduce picket line violence. By balancing the bargaining relationship at the table, we get to more agreements. It is good for business, and it is good for the economy.
I am glad my friend spoke up because the Conservative Party lately has been trying to pull the wool over Canadians' eyes saying that they are somehow the friends of workers. They have voted against anti-scab legislation every time in the House. They have ordered workers back to work, violating their Charter right to strike. They even tried to raise the retirement age to 67, which is particularly hard on blue-collar workers, who have to do physical work and use their bodies. They opposed dental care. They opposed pharmacare and anything that would help workers actually get a break in these unaffordable times.
I just want to conclude by saying that, when New Democrats filibustered in 2011 for three days, we did so when the Harper government wanted to order Canadian post workers back to work. The Conservatives, when they did it just this week, were doing it to give a break to their corporate friends from the carbon tax. I think that tells workers all they need to know about which party really stands up for workers in the House.
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- Dec/14/23 5:06:40 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, to pick up on the member's last words with regard to our not being there yet, she is right in her assessment. We do not know the position that the Conservative Party is going to take; if its members end up voting against the legislation, I trust that they will do whatever they can in order to filibuster the debate, so it does not become a law.
I appreciated the member's comments about scab labour. It causes a great deal of harm having scabs cross the line, not only in the workforce, in the areas in which they are working, but also outside the workforce in our communities. Could she just expand on her thoughts on that?
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- Dec/14/23 5:07:43 p.m.
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Madam Speaker, the fact that the official opposition's position is unknown could slow the work down, but I clearly read that the Leader of the Opposition said they were pro-worker. It is not that much of a stretch. Someone who is pro-worker should be in favour of this bill.
What does a strong, fair anti-scab bill accomplish? First, it reduces the length of disputes, that is for sure. I gave some examples of that earlier. It also makes workplaces safer. We have seen confrontations break out when scabs are brought in. Finally, it significantly reduces picket line conflicts.
I would go so far as to say that an anti-scab bill improves labour relations, especially during a strike.
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Madam Speaker, it is real and distinct honour to rise this evening and speak to Bill C-58, which would ban the use of replacement workers in strikes and lockouts. This is a bill that is the result of a lot of work over a lot of years by a lot of folks.
The other day, I had a chance to stand at the press conference here in the foyer when the tabling of this bill was announced. I listened to labour leaders speak about the long history behind this bill and how long workers in this country have been fighting to have their rights protected to ensure that when they make that difficult decision to go on strike, they are not going to be at risk of violence and their rights to collectively bargain are not going to be undermined by the use of replacement workers. This is an effort that has taken place over more than 100 years.
Certainly I am proud to rise as part of the NDP, a party whose roots are in labour and a party that has worked for more than 15 years to bring forward in this House, time and time and time again, bills that would do precisely what would be done by Bill C-58.
This is really a momentous occasion, and I want to take a moment to read into the record part of an email that I received from a constituent who reached out and wanted me to understand what this bill means for him in his workplace.
He wrote to me and said, “Hello again, Mr. Bachrach. ... I've been a union member for over 13 years while working at Telus. ... I've seen Telus attempt to get away with bullying and scare tactics in the workplace to reduce the numbers of our union members and their voice, then benefit from it at the bargaining table, negotiation after negotiation. This time around, we lost more again. I plead with you to assist in pushing the Anti-Scab legislation forward to prevent large corporations...from allowing scabs or replacement workers in to do our work during a dispute and undermining our negotiations.”
That really speaks to the significance of this bill for working people across this country. Nobody takes the decision to go on strike lightly. This is something that affects the families of working people. They need to know that when they make that difficult decision and they choose to exercise their constitutionally protected right to strike, their rights are going to be respected and their rights are not going to be able to be undermined and they are going to be able to fight for better working conditions and to do so in a way that results in a fair and equitable deal at the end of the day.
That brings my time to an end. It is far too little time to do justice to such an important issue. I just want to say how proud I am to stand in this House and support this bill. I do hope that our Conservative friends down the way will also see fit to support Bill C-58. What better message is there to send to the working people of this country than to vote unanimously for this bill to ban replacement workers?
I have a lot of respect for many of my colleagues down the way. I have listened intently to what they have said with respect to this bill, and I do believe—
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