Hon. Senators: Agreed.

(Motion agreed to.)

Hon. Senators: Hear, hear.

Hon. Senators: Hear, hear!

Senator Plett: Yes.

Hon. Marc Gold (Government Representative in the Senate): Thank you for your question.

As all colleagues know, the B.C. government had requested of the government the ability to run a three-year pilot project for the decriminalization of drugs in British Columbia. The project is but one year old. As Minister Saks announced, the government is considering the request of B.C., just as it is considering the request of the City of Toronto for a similar pilot project. It takes its partnership with the provinces on the administration of justice and on health issues — because this is a health issue — very seriously.

The program that British Columbia requested is one that saves lives. The adjustment to that program that the Government of B.C. has asked the government to consider is under consideration.

Some Hon. Senators: Hear, hear.

(At midnight, pursuant to rule 3-4, the Senate adjourned until later this day at 2 p.m.)

The Hon. the Speaker informed the Senate that a message had been received from the House of Commons returning Bill C-29, An Act to provide for the establishment of a national council for reconciliation, and acquainting the Senate that they have agreed to the amendments made by the Senate to this bill without further amendment.

[English]

Hon. Hassan Yussuff moved second reading of Bill C-50, An Act respecting accountability, transparency and engagement to support the creation of sustainable jobs for workers and economic growth in a net-zero economy.

He said: Honourable senators, today I rise to speak to Bill C-50, the Canadian sustainable jobs act. It is a piece of legislation that I am passionate about.

Why? It’s because this bill is fundamentally about workers, protecting their rights and interests, supporting their families and enabling their communities to grow.

Colleagues, we can no longer deny or avoid the environmental, societal and economic threats of climate change. We see it all around us, from increased temperatures, floods, fires and droughts. No part of our country is immune, and no part of our society or our economy can avoid being impacted. Climate change is causing economic change; that is undeniable. It is happening in every country — large or small, capitalist or communist, authoritarian regime or democratic society — around the world.

Change can be good, or it can be devastating. In large part, it depends on how well you recognize the change that is coming, and how well we can prepare for it.

The question, colleagues, that you are essentially being asked in supporting this bill is whether you want to recognize the change. If you do, it’s whether you want to prepare our economy and our workers for it.

Dr. Fatih Birol, the Executive Director of the International Energy Agency, said:

The transition to clean energy is happening worldwide and it’s unstoppable. It’s not a question of ‘if’, it’s just a matter of ‘how soon’ . . . .

Senators, Bill C-50 lays the framework for how we can help workers and their communities deal with the effects that climate change will have on an economy and labour market that will inevitably be impacted.

Nearly every country in the world has committed to the Paris Agreement and the target to fight climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions. That includes sectors like energy, transportation, buildings, manufacturing and beyond.

In Canada and around the world, that progress is being made because companies are ramping up energy efficiency and adopting low-carbon alternatives, while delivering the same goods that people rely on day in and day out.

The global commitment made nine years ago in Paris is not simply a political declaration. It has sent a signal to capital markets and, yes, to labour markets around the world.

The International Energy Agency’s recent report made it clear that trillions of dollars of investment globally are shifting away from assets that are incompatible with a sustainable, net-zero future — like unabated coal power — to those that are.

The Royal Bank of Canada recently forecasted that Canada can add 400,000 clean energy jobs on the path to net zero by the end of this decade.

In Canada, we are already seeing this first-hand. Consider the auto industry, where we have seen multi-billion dollar investments in the electric vehicle and battery supply chain, from companies like Ford, Volkswagen, Umicore, Michelin, Northvolt, Stellantis and just recently Honda in Alliston, Ontario. This is creating jobs for construction and auto workers from Bridgewater, Nova Scotia, to Bécancour, Quebec, from St. Thomas to Windsor to Alliston, Ontario, and beyond.

Consider the hydrogen industry. Hydrogen is a zero-carbon fuel source that is incredibly energy-dense, and can be made in a variety of ways to reduce diesel and other heavy-emitting fuels.

Companies like Air Products, EverWind Fuels and World Energy are creating new plants and stations across the supply chain, from production and transportation to the end use of hydrogen. This means good jobs for workers in Stephenville, in Cape Breton, in the Niagara Region and in Edmonton, just to name a few.

Consider the building sector. As we see a boom in housing construction, we are also seeing a rise in innovation from modular housing in the use of low-carbon Canadian building materials like mass timber or steel made using electric arc furnaces.

All of this innovation means good jobs in Canada’s building trades sectors — for electricians — and other trades in every region of this country.

Innovations in agriculture and biofuels, in the nuclear industry, in electricity transmission and in renewables have also created the same high demand for one of our country’s most important resources: Canadian skilled labour.

For Canada to reach its full potential in becoming a global leader in many of these industries, we must ensure that we are able to meet this demand for Canadian workers, while also effectively equipping those same workers to succeed.

That is precisely what the Canadian sustainable jobs act is meant to lay the groundwork for.

Colleagues, I would like to now go through the main aspects of the bill in how it can help workers, and talk about some improvements to the bill that happened in the other place.

Senators, the Canadian sustainable jobs act is the result of years of extensive consultations and work across multiple government departments.

It has been shaped, in part, through the work of the Task Force on Just Transition for Canadian Coal Power Workers and Communities, which I co-chaired in 2018. It is supported by Canadian labour unions, industry, environmental leaders and experts in sectors including workforce training.

I now want to briefly go over the five key aspects of the bill and what they aim to achieve, and then I will highlight some of the improvements that were made to the bill as it went through the legislative process in the other place.

There are five key elements to this legislation as it intends to create a framework to support workers as they move to more sustainable jobs.

The bill includes guiding principles, a governance structure and transparency and accountability requirements.

First, the bill establishes guiding principles, including social dialogue, decent work, inclusive approaches and fostering strengthened global efforts.

Second, with the passage of this bill, the government will establish a sustainable jobs partnership council composed of representatives from labour, industry, Indigenous communities, environmental organizations and other experts. The council will have meaningful and frequent public consultations with Canadians, using the input they receive, combined with their expertise, to advise the government on strategies and measures to encourage the creation of more sustainable jobs while growing a net-zero economy.

Third, the bill will designate ministers responsible for implementing the act and the five-year action plans that are required.

Fourth, the bill will create a sustainable jobs secretariat to assist and coordinate federal actions.

Finally, the fifth element requires the development of updated action plans every five years.

These plans will report on the progress the government has made on prior commitments and will be designed to benefit communities and workers so they can seize the opportunities associated with the move to clean energy.

These are the core elements of this legislation that are critical to ensuring that workers have a seat at the table and that workforce policy is consistent with Canada’s climate policy.

Now, I would like to speak to the substance of the amendment process that occurred in the House of Commons. In close collaboration with workers, labour leaders, environmental organizations and other parties in the other place, the government further strengthened the legislation and added additional amendments that increased accountability, transparency and certainty.

For instance, the partnership council, reflecting the tripartite approach outlined in the Sustainable Jobs Plan, is now balanced between representatives of Indigenous voices, labour and industry, while reflecting the diverse perspectives of other stakeholders. This is important to deliver on the important principle of social dialogue while ensuring workers have a seat at the table so they can discuss their own future.

This legislation is also now linked to the Canadian Net-Zero Emissions Accountability Act, which will mandate that the sustainable jobs action plans detail and take into consideration the 2030 Emissions Reduction Plan. This further ensures workers’ voices are included in efforts to fight climate change, grow Canada’s low-carbon economy and ensure communities in every region of the country can benefit.

The legislation would also recognize the important roles that the provinces, territories and other levels of government play in the advancement of sustainable job opportunities.

While this legislation only affects areas of federal jurisdiction, the duties of the partnership council and the development of action plans every five years must include engagement with the provinces, territories and other levels of government.

Government-wide and cross-jurisdictional collaboration is an important factor in gathering analysis, input and growing new economic opportunities for workers.

This is also an important aspect of the sustainable jobs secretariat. With the goal of creating a coherent set of policies that reflect a whole-of-government approach to sustainable jobs, the secretariat will collaborate with each department in its respective area of expertise to support and help coordinate the design of the action plan measures across different governmental departments. The secretariat also now plays a role in external engagement, serving as a point of contact for employers and workers.

Senators, the sustainable jobs act has been thoroughly considered and strengthened over almost one year it has been in the other place to produce a bill that is supported by industry, workers, environmental leaders, labour organizations and beyond.

Ultimately, it is the need to support workers and the broad consensus across Canadian society in support of the sustainable jobs act that drove me to sponsor this piece of legislation. As many of you know, creating sustainable jobs and helping communities and workers in every region of the country during a time of global change is an issue I am very familiar with and am personally very passionate about.

In 2018, I co-chaired the Task Force on Just Transition for Canadian Coal Power Workers and Communities. The task force was mandated to engage with workers and communities in the provinces and territories directly impacted by the phase-out of unabated coal-fired electricity. We met directly with coal workers, coal communities and public officials in Alberta, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick. This engagement informed advice to the Minister of Environment and Climate Change on how to support workers and their communities. The task force’s final report was unanimously supported by all those who participated in this work.

Much of this advice is reflected in the sustainable jobs act, such as embedding principles in planning and legislative processes to ensure ongoing action by government is taken to support workers.

Co-chairing the task force was a very memorable experience of serving my country. At the time, I was also President of the Canadian Labour Congress, working to represent the voices of over 3 million workers.

When we agreed to support, of course, the phasing out of coal-powered electricity generation, not one of the unions that represent workers in those sectors dissented with that decision, because they recognized fundamentally what it would do for the environment, what it would do for climate change and what it would do for human health. But they also recognized that some of these jobs are the best-paying jobs that workers could possibly have. In many cases, they paid anywhere between $60,000 and $100,000 per year.

Despite that reality, the union supported the phasing out of coal-fired electricity generation in this country because they recognized that if they want their families and children to have a future, it is about recognizing the damage we are doing to the environment and to the climate and how we are destroying human health in our communities at the same time. Was it easy? No. Was it hard? It definitely was. But the conversations and the efforts to ensure we can achieve this as a country working together were more important than anything else we could do. We recognized that we cannot bury our heads in the sand and refuse to acknowledge the reality and the changes occurring around us.

It is notable that Canada is among other countries, such as Germany, South Africa, Poland and many others, which also created task forces that went out to talk directly to workers and their community leaders about how they can phase out coal. Much of what we have done they are learning from.

These conversations enabled us to meaningfully talk about ways we can help individuals leverage their skill sets and to determine the steps the government needs to take to meet the needs of the workforce and build sustainable communities.

I know from experience there’s no substitute for these kinds of discussions, because creating good public policy requires that the government engage authentically with the workers whose lives are going to be affected by the decisions.

It is no exaggeration to say that those town halls were some of the most meaningful experiences I have had in my life, whether we were in Alberta to talk to coal communities and workers who were going to lose their jobs and what would replace that, or going to Estevan in Saskatchewan to a town hall to engage workers in their community about what these changes would mean to them and what we could do to help them, or going to Nova Scotia. I travelled across that great province listening to workers. We went to Cape Breton, in the coal community, to understand first-hand what will happen in those communities. It was not easy, but we recognized fundamentally that we have a role and a responsibility to talk to Canadians about the future we want to build together.

I knew that if we did not show up in person, if we failed to take the time to listen, we were not going to learn how we can do things better and truly support Canadian workers and their communities, because good policy starts with listening.

I am pleased to see that in the development of the sustainable jobs act and the interim plan, the government regularly engaged with Canadians throughout the entire process. The government was provided with input from Canada’s provinces and territories, as well as opinions and advice from workers and union representatives, historically marginalized groups, Indigenous peoples, advocates for civil society, industry experts and environmental organizations.

Over the course of the consultation process, many in-person discussions were held by officials, in addition to further engagement through other avenues. Their goal was to learn what people thought about certain elements that would be included in the legislation, as well as their opinions about the possible actions the government detailed in the discussion paper on a people-centred approach.

Also, the government took into consideration more than 75 comprehensive submissions from dozens of Canadian organizations on this legislation and sustainable jobs in general. They reviewed some 30,000 emails from across Canada to inform both this legislation and the interim Sustainable Jobs Plan that was made public in February of 2023, which I encourage honourable senators to review.

Also, I am aware that as this legislation passed through the other place, there was extensive engagement with members of the government and the caucuses of other parties in the House of Commons.

As I mentioned, there are many who have come out in support of this bill. The International Union of Operating Engineers said:

The Canadian Sustainable Jobs Act is a step toward a future that puts the interests of energy workers at the forefront of a low-carbon economy. . . .

By the way, these are the same workers who just built a pipeline, completed with their skills and labour, that now gives Alberta a second way to get their energy to market in the Pacific region.

The President of the Business Council of Alberta said:

The Sustainable Jobs Act represents an important opportunity for Canada: to shape our future and create jobs by providing the resources that the world needs—including energy, food, and minerals. . . .

The President of the Canadian Labour Congress said:

Workers need action now, we needed it yesterday, and we need to make sure that we get this legislation passed so all parties – labour, business, and government can sit down at a table . . .

A youth-led organization called re•generation said they support the plan and bill because it:

. . . will help ensure that green jobs are available for anyone who wants one. It will establish a partnership council to directly involve workers and communities in the transition, and allocate critical funding to green skills development and training.

The President of the Alberta Federation of Labour said:

Bill C-50 is about creating a framework for discussion on diversifying our economy so that we’re prepared for a lower carbon future. That’s good for workers, that’s good for business, that’s good for the country.

The Vice-President of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers International said, “Through this legislation, the Government of Canada has demonstrated its commitment to protecting good-paying, highly skilled jobs. . . .”

The Executive Director of the Pembina Institute said:

Passing the Sustainable Jobs Act and getting the new Sustainable Jobs Partnership Council working will deliver the message, loud and clear: Canada is a great place to invest, with workers who are second to none and ready to get the job done.

Meanwhile, the head of Canada’s Building Trades Unions said they welcome Bill C-50, which is:

. . . aimed at addressing Canada’s transition to a net-zero economy, which brings forth key aspects including the creation of a Sustainable Jobs Partnership Council to provide meaningful consultation during the transition.

There are many more voices I could cite here, colleagues, who have been clear in their support for this vital and strengthened piece of legislation.

Honourable colleagues, let me end by saying this: The Canadian sustainable jobs act provides the government with a critical opportunity to support the creation of a fundamental anchor for a sustainable jobs policy. It shows Canadians that we are in it together for the long haul, however long that may take.

If passed, the Canadian sustainable jobs act will ensure that Canadian workers will continue to be at the centre of this deeply important work, and that the workers will have a seat at the table.

I urge you to reflect on the many important points contained in the legislation and the many amendments that were successfully made by the government and other members of Parliament in close consultation with stakeholders who care deeply about ensuring Canadian workers win at the end of the day.

Colleagues, this bill gives workers a seat and voice at the table that can impact the decisions that will affect their work, families and communities.

Now it is time for us to study and pass Bill C-50. It is my sincere hope that every member of the Senate will support this piece of legislation so we can ensure that Canadian workers win. I look forward to working with you on the passage of this bill. Thank you so much.

I will take any questions.

Hon. Michèle Audette: Would the honourable senator take a question?

Senator Yussuff: Yes.

Hon. Clément Gignac: Senator Yussuff, thank you for your involvement and the informative briefing you organized with government officials. We appreciate it very much.

Make no mistake, I think almost all of us recognize the impact of climate change and the necessity to accelerate toward a greener economy.

Having said that, I have a concern about the lack of collaboration or cooperation from provinces such as Alberta and Quebec, which have mentioned they have no interest in collaborating. Provinces are closer to employers’ and employees’ needs than the federal government.

You mentioned that this bill received the support of workers, industry, labour leaders and environmental organizations, but no commitment from provinces.

My question is this: In the absence of provincial commitment, could you reassure me that it will not be another example of red tape from the federal government with the creation of a new secretariat or council?

Senator Yussuff: First, let me thank my colleague for his question. I appreciate his participating in the briefing that was provided.

As you know, the provinces have their own jurisdictions and guard them intensely. I don’t need to give you any examples of that. I can assure you that for the success of the Canadian sustainable jobs act, provinces will have to be engaged in the process. The workers who work in their provinces will be impacted by it as a result of the shift to a low-carbon economy and, more importantly, measures that will be required will have to be collaborative.

Right now, as you know, the federal government transfers large sums of money to the provinces for training on an ongoing basis. Part of that ongoing effort will be around how provinces can support workers to get retraining and update their skills as they move from certain jobs to the new jobs that will be created within those provinces.

At the end of the day, all of that will require the provinces impacted by a shift to a low-carbon economy and the federal government to talk with each other to ensure they are not duplicating their efforts, but instead equally ensuring the resources allocated will go to support the workers, communities and an industry that wants to transform itself to ensure they are sustainable for the near future.

[Translation]

Hon. David M. Wells: Thank you, Senator Yussuff. Will you take another question?

Senator Yussuff: Yes.

Hon. David Richards: Will the honourable senator take a question?

Senator Yussuff: Yes.

Hon. Amina Gerba: I’d like to start by congratulating you on how active you have been here in the Senate because I think you’re one of the most active senators in our cohort that was sworn in on November 22 and I have lost track of how many bills you’ve sponsored in this chamber. Congratulations. My question has to do with businesses that are taking some action or that have clean work methods. Are there specific incentives for those businesses that invest a lot, mainly at the industrial level, to make their machinery less polluting?

[English]

Senator Yussuff: Thank you. That is a very important question. I’m not sure I’m the most active senator here. Perception and reality are not one and the same. I know one thing: I’m not sleeping on the job.

I appreciate the opportunity to participate in the broader discussion regarding legislation. I’m very passionate. I spent a lifetime defending workers, so for anything to do with workers I’ll stand up and be counted. I’m honoured to do that. I think it’s fair to say that the Canadian industry in general has been going through transformative changes. I’ll talk about two with which I’m familiar.

The steel industry in this country has been very productive, generating many good jobs, and it continues to be an important part of the economy. As I speak to you, our steel industry is going through an incredible change. They used to use coal as an important part of making steel. Many of them are now switching to our way of making steel, and I think that’s a good thing. We’ll still need steel in this country, but they will require some help to get there.

As you know, during the period of the renegotiation of the North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA — now called the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement, or CUSMA — our American friends levelled tariffs on our country, some of which have been used to transform the steel industry. The government has used some of that money here. Equally, I think many industries will go through similar changes as they are required to reduce their emissions while ensuring that they’re sustainable and profitable going forward. I think the federal government is working with industry — as are the provinces and territories — to ensure they can meet the challenges of the future.

I know one thing: If workers do not have the ability to renew and improve their skills, we will not have the successful country we’ve had in the past. I know this for a fact. The coal industry in this country made us rich. It’s no accident. Let’s remember how this country was developed. Workers mined that coal, transported it to communities and used it to heat their houses. In some areas in Cape Breton Island, they’re still using it to heat their homes. As we change and learn from the environmental challenges we face, those workers will no longer be needed for mining coal. What can we have them do? They have incredible skills. How can we transition them to a future that gives them the opportunity to have a good job, raise a family and build strong communities?

I don’t have all the answers to that, but I think this bill is one part of that going forward.

Some Hon. Senators: No.

Some Hon. Senators: Yes.

The Hon. the Speaker: Is leave granted?

Hon. Diane Bellemare: Will Senator Yussuff take a question?

Senator Yussuff: Yes.

The Hon. the Speaker: There’s very little time left, and I have one more senator who wants to ask a question. Are you asking for more time, Senator Yussuff?

Senator Yussuff: I would kindly ask the chamber to consider another five minutes.

The Hon. the Speaker: I hear a “no.” Sorry.

[Translation]

Hon. Senators: Agreed.

Senator Cuzner: Would the honourable senator take a question?