Welcome, Minister, to your new role, and I want to thank you for sharing your family’s history and background with Stelco.

On July 15, 1946, the USW 1005 went on strike and faced union-busting tactics such as the use of scab workers. Right-wing politicians tried every tool that they had to bust up the union. At one time, an army of hundreds of scab workers armed with rubber hoses, axe handles and bricks attacked the workers at Stelco. In the end, the union prevailed against the right-wing politicians and the scab army.

My question: Will you support NDP legislation to block the union-busting tactic of allowing scab workers?

I’d like to thank the member from Thunder Bay–Superior North for her comments that are truly in support of workers. It’s disturbing that the WSIB has taken so long to recognize workplace exposures and is still rather reluctant to recognize multiple exposures, especially where there are clusters of industrial disease.

As an omnibus bill, Working for Workers could have addressed so many other pressing issues which impacted workers. I wonder if the member could talk about the disturbing problem of deeming, or phantom jobs.

I’d like to thank the member for London West for her excellent comments and her analysis of the current plights of working people, whether it’s gig workers or temporary foreign workers, and also the importance of equal pay for equal work. In this government’s legislation, they talk about “scumbag” employers, and in some ways it’s almost as through this government doth protest too much.

I would like to ask the member, is it a scumbag move to block collective bargaining? Is it a scumbag move to waste money in a losing court battle, and is it a scumbag move to engage in a costly appeal and withhold what’s fair for nurses?

I would like to thank the member from Orléans for his presentation. We’ve heard from government members claiming there will be presumptive coverage for pancreatic and thyroid cancers for firefighters, yet it does not exist within the bill. Earlier, I’d spoken to the government members about Bud Simpson, a Sarnia native who passed away from nasopharyngeal and gastrointestinal cancer which metastasized to his brain.

But I also wanted to share, from the Occupational Disease Reform Alliance, somebody from Peterborough who worked at General Electric—his widow’s name is Sara Sharpe. He worked there for 42 years and, unfortunately, he passed away just after he was nicely retired, with esophageal cancer. He passed away within two weeks.

My question to the member: Would you like to see multiple exposures covered in presumptive coverage, such as we’ve discussed?

I’d like to thank the member from Oshawa for her comments. I know that she’s a member who stands with workers in thought, word and deed, but I wondered if the member could take us back in time to a time when Oshawa GM was under threat, a time when the Premier actually said, after meeting with GM executives, “They told me straight-up there’s nothing we can do”—as if taking his orders from somebody else—“the ship has already left the dock.”

But at that time, speaking of the title of this bill, Working for Workers, I would like the member to describe how Oshawa workers stood up for workers when this government rolled over and turned their back on workers.

I’d like to thank the member for his comments. I just want to express my condolences on the loss of your father due to occupational disease. It’s terrible.

We’ve noticed on the official opposition side that nowhere in the bill is it included that firefighters will be protected with presumptive coverage for pancreatic and thyroid cancer, but we welcome that. It’s unfortunate that it’s not codified within this legislation.

I did want to also mirror the words of the Occupational Disease Reform Alliance. They noted a fellow who unfortunately passed away. His name was Bud Simpson. He worked at Fibreglass Sarnia for 36 years. Sarnia is the occupational disease capital and the heart of the petrochemical industry. In 2011, the World Health Organization said that it had the most polluted air in the country. Despite that, multiple exposures are not covered under WSIB, as I’m sure you know. Would you like to see that included in reforms to WSIB covering multiple exposures?