A private Conservative “union boss” bill to repeal the decades-old membership card system used to certify bargaining agents is “unbelievable”, says the head of the Canadian Labour Congress.
Bill C-525 now at Second Reading in the Commons would also permit decertification of unions with the votes of as few as 45 percent of members.
“That is unbelievable,” said Ken Georgetti, congress president.
“They are basically saying that not only do we have to get a majority of people to vote to certify to join a union, but those people who don’t vote are deemed to be voting against the union.”
The bill would amend the Canada Labour Code, Public Service Labour Relations Act and Parliamentary Employment & Staff Relations Act affecting more than one million workers, from public servants to employees of federally-regulated industries like railways, marine shipping, airports, banking and broadcasting.
“It is a simplistic approach to a complex issue,” Georgetti said in an interview. “Canadians have a right to access collective bargaining and this legislation would take that away.”
The Labour Code currently permits a simple majority of workers to apply to certify a bargaining agent by signing union membership cards.
Under C-525 An Act To Amend The Canada Labour Code certification would require a majority of employees’ votes by secret ballot.
“We did a calculation across the country and if that was the standard for Members of Parliament, nobody would have been elected in this Parliament,” said Georgetti, noting few MPs received 50 percent or more of ballots cast in their constituencies, let alone 50 percent of the votes of registered electors.
The bill’s sponsor MP Blaine Calkins, a former Parks Canada employee, has refused Blacklock’s multiple interview requests.
“Are you allowed to walk around here harassing me?” Calkins said when asked for comment outside Conservative caucus.
In Second Reading debate on his legislation, the MP from Westaskiwin, Alta. said the bill was intended to curb “union bosses”, citing the phrase five times in a twenty-minute address to the House.
“I will not be intimidated by union bosses,” said Calkins; “Unions are driven by the need for power”; “Union bosses…want to maintain their stranglehold on workers and muzzle their democratic voice.”
Calkins’ bill mirrors Saskatchewan legislation bound for the Supreme Court. Justices agreed to hear a 2014 union appeal of the Trade Union Amendment Act, passed by the Regina legislature in 2008, that lowered the threshold for decertification to 45 percent.
Labour Minister Kellie Leitch has declined interviews on C-525, though Leitch’s department advised MPs to pass the legislation.
“We support the intent behind Bill C-525 and will vote in favour of it,” said MP Cathy McLeod, parliamentary secretary for labour, in debate on the bill.
“If 11 out of 20 employees sign the union membership card, the remaining 9 individuals may not be asked to sign and may not even be aware that their colleagues want to form a union, yet would automatically be unionized,” said McLeod, MP for Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo, B.C. “This means that in many cases, unions can be certified without giving all employees the opportunity to express their wishes.”
By Dale Smith