Labour relations in the public sector appear to be reaching a crisis point. What’s going on?
On the union side, the rancour is relatively minor compared to many U.S. jurisdictions. In Wisconsin, Texas, Michigan, Idaho and Arizona, public sector unions are seeking the recall of lawmakers sponsoring legislation reducing workers’ benefits.
But here there is growing public concern, not all of it recent.
Take 2009: a three-month strike of contract professors at York University disrupted the academic year for 45,000 students; bare-knuckle city bargaining led to prolonged strikes — eight weeks in Toronto and three months in Windsor — ending in settlements that, in retrospect, should have been achievable without protracted work stoppages.
And now, Air Canada and Canada Post. To their credit, the CAW and Air Canada agreed to submit their outstanding dispute on pensions for new hires to an arbitrator and settled the other disputed items — which probably would have happened without the federal government’s precipitate tabling of back-to-work legislation.
But the federal government, recognizing that Canada Post and CUPW were locked in a battle with no early resolution in sight, has decided — correctly, in my view — to intervene to end the dispute.
From the union’s perspective, the legislation is pretty draconian, fixing the duration of the agreement, establishing the percentage wage increases below those offered by Canada Post in negotiations, and imposing strict limitations on the arbitrator’s jurisdiction to resolve the pension dispute.
These cases all raise the broader issue: how is the public interest in receiving affordable services to be reconciled with the workers’ rights to fair and equitable wages, benefits and other terms and conditions of employment?
The conventional route in the legislatively defined essential service sector, where work stoppages are prohibited, is the compulsory interest arbitration that now exists for police, firefighters, hospital and nursing home workers, and most recently in Ontario, the TTC. Here, there is a critical drumbeat, principally from management, that interest arbitrators habitually render unaffordable awards favouring the trade union side.
Tim Hudak’s provincial Conservative party has joined this chorus, its platform claiming that arbitrators award unions “excessive contracts,” with Ontario families getting “stuck with the bill.” Hudak says the system is “badly broken” and if elected, he will “fix it.”
It will be interesting to see his evidence to support these allegations. In terms of wages, the Ministry of Labour’s data show that the average annual increase awarded by arbitrators in the public sector in 2010 was 2.0 per cent — the lowest in the last decade — compared to 2.1 per cent for negotiated settlements in the private sector.
To be sure, these figures do not include non-wage benefits. But if there are arbitration awards that include significant non-wage benefits above those agreed to in pre-arbitration negotiations, where are they?
Prior to arbitration, intensive public mediation/conciliation occurs. In Ontario, the professional mediators, led by Reg Pearson, are as good as or better than any in Canada. But at the real deadlock stage, even the ablest of full-time public mediators don’t have the clout of savvy, persuasive politicians.
In the 1970s and 1980s — the Bill Davis years — labour ministers and the premier himself frequently intervened personally to persuade, cajole and, yes, threaten negotiators, if necessary, to compromise positions. As a result, there were fewer lengthy work stoppages in the public sector and fewer back-to-work statutes.
In the mid-1970s, the Labour Relations Act was amended to permit the Ministry of Labour to appoint a disputes advisory committee (DAC). The intent was to have blue-ribbon appointees, one management and one labour, ideally retired and without ties to either bargaining party but with proven credentials in the bargaining arena, to enter the fray and collaboratively work on each side to come together — with the ultimate threat, in the absence of resolution, of a joint DAC report recommending the contours of a fair and reasonable settlement. To my knowledge, this statutory mechanism has rarely, if ever, been used.
Surely, as the problems outlined above mount, now is the time to utilize all feasible options, including the legitimate and timely intervention by political leaders, and the recruitment of external expertise and influence of the sort contemplated in the DAC technique. Otherwise, especially given the continuing post-recession economic pressures and concerns, the bargaining process in these key sectors is likely to continue to deteriorate, to the detriment of the parties and the public.
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